i know this isn't quite what the article is getting at, but i found myself conscious of my stance and walking after the first time playing with the wii fit. may not seem like much to many of you, but i was immediately struck at how a seemingly simple piece of technology can have leave a real and lasting impression.
everything about the wii is just clever from an engineering/programming standpoint. it might not seem like it now, but i bet in 10 years, the wii will be cited as one of the great advancements in VR -- mainly because i think it will get us thinking differently about VR than the "lawnmower man" mentality.
of course, the other game is GTAIV, because of it's great simulation. although i do think it's a step backward form san andreas -- what i think would be a great thing to happen is for more cross-pollination in vide games -- eg, GTA has a great city/driving/shooting simulation, but not much else, really. "skate" has a great skateboarding simulation -- civilization has great AI, etc. if producers licensed their core engines, and made them modular, you could buy add-ons. eg, if you wanted skateboarding in GTA, you could buy the "skate" add-on.
"a number of very short sound particles that can last for between 1 and 10 milliseconds" sounds like granular synthesis. seems like a algorithmic composition (pitch, rythm, duration, etc.) driving a synth; and that the two data sets are unrelated
are you drunk or did you link to google's news page on purpose?
news.google.com is NOT google's portal. it's their, uh, news service. which is why the first word in the url (you know, the server name) is "news".
i would guess that www.google.com would be their portal, since it's their "www" server, as in "world wide web", which is this thing we're all -- oh, nevermind.
The only thing that I can imagine that could've caused an explosion in a datacenter is a battery bank (the data centers I've been in didn't have any large A/C transformers inside). And even then, I thought that the NEC had some fairly strict codes about firewalls, explosion-proof vaults and the like.
I just find it curious, since it's not unthinkable that rechargeable batteries might explode.
you certainly are missing the big picture, but i'm sure you're not the only one. the long and the short of it, is that google adwords *work*. maybe not on you and your friends, but in the big picture, they do. microsoft understands this.
google hit the advertising "holy grail" with adwords -- although no one has said/realized it, adwords are what the marketing industry has been wishing for since freud's nephew invented it -- specific and contextual advertising.
before adwords, advertisers mostly had to throw a bunch of shit at the wall and hope that some stuck. billboards and subway ads are a good example. anybody and everybody sees that ad, so if you have a niche or specific market, you have to advertise to 10k people to get to your 100.
radio and newspapers are a bit better -- if you want to advertise your new cat food, you can call the publishers of "cat fancy", and hit closer to the bulls' eye.
adwords allow advertising to a demographic of one. if you sell gloves that are missing the middle finger on one hand (for people who've lost that finger), you could theoretically dial in your adwords to catch that person.
adwords and gmail make it even more powerful. now, instead of catching people who are actively searching the web, you can just filter their email.
i use gmail, and i have actually clicked on a few adwords because i had sent an email to someone asking if they had xyz for sale, and the adwords threw up a link to an online store that did.
adwords are NOT banner ads. they're specific, they're not obnoxiousm, and they work. this is the piece of the pie microsoft wants to in on, and they're trying to acquire yahoo (at least their traffic) to do it.
i may be going too far here, but if they don't get yahoo, they're going to lose out on the (consumer) desktop in a big way -- is there a part of their business that isn't slipping?
before i get modded to hell, i'm usually not a doomsdayer.
however, i think this may be the point that we have all been dreading since the internet began -- the day we have to provide *real* identification to get access to casual (non commerce) sites.
i guess the glass-half-full part of me is wondering how facebook can verify age without compromising anonymity (and convenience for that matter).
one way to address this is to not allow unverified people to network with minors (what adults really would, anyway, unless they're spying on them or, well, the pedophiles this system is trying to address). although this is a bit ageist in that this would require minors to provide real id. this doesn't actually address the issue, only postpones full-compliance to future generations. . .
so, yeah. once this becomes commonplace (ie. when the infrastructure is in place), i can see the day when we all have to show our (real) ID at the door of every site we go to.
often it occurs to me that i will be looking back to these days and think, "wow, those were the days when the internet was free," as i hold my nationalIDcard up to the computer screen to be scanned . . .
point taken, i suppose i should have disclaimed, "tubes have high voltages that can kill," etc.
but really, just use the "only one hand in the amp at a time" rule, and you'll be fine. 400V isn't really *that* much, and as long as it doesn't go through the heart, think of it as electricity teaching you a lesson not to fu** with it that you will not soon forget.
i started on old fender amps that ran a rather high voltage, and having respect for it from the beginning has kept me from ever getting shocked.
i mean, what did kids that wanted to learn electronics before the 1950's do?
had you had engineering physics II (electric and magnetic theory)? the stuff in circuits makes much more sense if you've had the physics/calculus -- because then it makes sense why a capacitor integrates voltage and an inductor differentiates it.
or why a LRC circuit is a 2nd order diff eq.
but i've found that doing engineering-type circuit analysis and working on bang and olufsen receivers (eg) take place in two completely different areas of the brain.
fwiw, i've found the water pipe analogy is fairly useful: voltage is the water pressure, current is the rate of water flow, and resistance is faucet. power is what happens when the jet of water turns a wheel, and is made up of both pressure (voltage) and flow (current).
i suppose if you could control a large faucet with a small flow of water in a separate pipe, that would be a tube or transistor.
a check valve would be a diode and -- ok, i should stop.
The better the quality, the simpler and easier the circuit.
Get a receiver or amp that has a problem and mess with it. A receiver in "protect mode" is a good one since that pretty much means that you have a DC offset on the output. A bi-polar amp will drive you nuts, since *any* bad component will throw DC onto the output, but you'll learn a ton going through it. A mosfet amp is much simpler since they are more like tube amps in topology. Hell, for that matter, try to get ahold of an old tube amp. They are very simple and are a good way to get yer feet wet.
Or an old cassette deck, like an old Nakamichi. Nobody wants them anymore (and they shouldn't, either), but they have a lot of cool control/motor circuitry in them. Especially if you get a hold of one that's discrete -- ie, all the logic and control is done with transistors.
and get the service manual -- it'll have schematics and sometimes theory of operation.
Oh yeah, the advice for the Navy Manuals is right on. Those are the clearest and most comprehensive books on the subject.
took mine with a motu traveler for recording in venice, berlin and kolobzeg. rock solid, even when recording a large rocksteady ska band. the aluminum case helps "ruggedfy" it, and the powersupply autosenses 220v. very small and light, and you should be able to pick one up fairly cheap now.
i still can't understand why apple dropped the 12" laptop form.
sure, but what you explain is "processing", not "personality". while there are certainly differences between death and sleep, my point was that personality doesn't go *anywhere*. when the power is pulled, the lights go off. perhaps there is something akin to a "saved state" as you say, but that's the best case scenario -- and this saved state deteriorates quickly after the moment of death.
you know, i think this very thing every time i see an apple article on/. -- which constitute a good 20% of them. on the other hand, apple is responsible for most of what is exciting in computing/technology right now.
i'm replying to the 'youtubeisapussy' tag i guess. apparently, youtube is legally obliged to take something down if someone reports it as infringing. this is very salem-witch-trial-esque. someone should do an experiment and randomly challenge videos on youtube and see how many they can get taken down -- just to prove how broken the system is.
i had a short clip from the film "the cabinet of dr. caligari" on youtube with some music that i produced. it was recently taken down by the request of Friedrich-Wilhelm-Murnau-Stiftung -- which as far as i could tell distributed the film. Of course, the film, being made in the early 1900's is in the public domain, as far as i can tell. so i think this guy knew that youtube had to take it down, no questions asked, and sent them a DMCA letter.
i responded to youtube, this is what they sent back:
We received notification from Friedrich-Wilhelm-Murnau-Stiftung. When we're notified that a particular video uploaded to our site infringes another's copyright, we remove the material as the law requires. If you feel a content owner has misidentified your content as infringing, you may file a DMCA counter-notification.
the counter-notification procedure is outlined here: google support
the worrisome bit is that i become liable if i am found to "knowingly infringe". this means that if this guys lawyers can show that i knew that it infringed, then i am liable for their costs. what happens if i win? nothing. either way, i'm at risk of paying money. especially since i would probably need to get my own lawyer if i were to pursue the issue.
it sucks. this guy is bluffing, and effectively asserting copyright control over something that is in the public domain (unless he legally got the rights somehow).
and it's just not a priority in my life right now. i just happen to really dig the film, and was working on a soundtrack for it, and then i posted one of the clips to youtube.
I think it's unlikely for Apple to release an iPod with a screen as big as the iPhone, simply because there is no need for so much information on a simple music player.
it seems that the ipods of the future will not be simple music players. they will do video et al from itunes.
an interesting question, is will all ipods in the future be more like the iphone, running os x and wifi? i guess it comes down to how much they can pack into one for the price -- also, the backwards-thinking cell companies would prevent a super low priced iphone. . .
it would be cool to have an unlimited data plan for your ipod in some sort of hassle free deal -- maybe $30 to at&t could get you dsl and unlimited 3g access . . . . (although i won't be switching to an iphone any time soon since i get 500 minutes + unlimited data with sprint for $30/mo)
you're exactly right. the only thing that really interests me about the iphone is that it's a phone that works with my mac. it really does suck that there isn't a standard of some sort for sync'ing cell phones to pc's. the iphone is really just a vendor lock-in option for mac fanboys like myself. mac people and linux people usually get along since apple seems to support a lot of *nix standards.
viewing websites on my current cell phone is a very lynx-esque experience -- arrowing between various links on the page, the pressing enter.
i have downloaded "mobile" versions of gmail and google maps for my cell phone.
i just don't see that this is a big deal. besides, to me, the most attractive thing about the iphone is that it will perfectly sync with my mac -- address book, calendar, itunes, iphoto, etc.
yes, but the problem is not high prices of fuel per se -- it's the lack of infrastructure. the big car/tire companies bought and dismantled the public transit system of many major american cities years ago. consequently, many people rely on their cars to commute to work. in addition, everybody here STILL insists on driving the largest car possible. it's weird.
in st louis, the public transit system is essentially broken. i will say that i've noticed many more scooters on the street since gas hit $3/gal, however.
Slashdot Mirror
i know this isn't quite what the article is getting at, but i found myself conscious of my stance and walking after the first time playing with the wii fit. may not seem like much to many of you, but i was immediately struck at how a seemingly simple piece of technology can have leave a real and lasting impression.
everything about the wii is just clever from an engineering/programming standpoint. it might not seem like it now, but i bet in 10 years, the wii will be cited as one of the great advancements in VR -- mainly because i think it will get us thinking differently about VR than the "lawnmower man" mentality.
of course, the other game is GTAIV, because of it's great simulation. although i do think it's a step backward form san andreas -- what i think would be a great thing to happen is for more cross-pollination in vide games -- eg, GTA has a great city/driving/shooting simulation, but not much else, really. "skate" has a great skateboarding simulation -- civilization has great AI, etc. if producers licensed their core engines, and made them modular, you could buy add-ons. eg, if you wanted skateboarding in GTA, you could buy the "skate" add-on.
ok, enough conjecture, more coffee. . .
mr c
"a number of very short sound particles that can last for between 1 and 10 milliseconds" sounds like granular synthesis. seems like a algorithmic composition (pitch, rythm, duration, etc.) driving a synth; and that the two data sets are unrelated
granular synthesis:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Granular_synthesis
mr c
anybody know if holding down "t" during startup turns the laptop into a usb drive?
mr c
are you drunk or did you link to google's news page on purpose?
news.google.com is NOT google's portal. it's their, uh, news service. which is why the first word in the url (you know, the server name) is "news".
i would guess that www.google.com would be their portal, since it's their "www" server, as in "world wide web", which is this thing we're all -- oh, nevermind.
mr c
The only thing that I can imagine that could've caused an explosion in a datacenter is a battery bank (the data centers I've been in didn't have any large A/C transformers inside). And even then, I thought that the NEC had some fairly strict codes about firewalls, explosion-proof vaults and the like.
I just find it curious, since it's not unthinkable that rechargeable batteries might explode.
mr c
usually.
mr c
you certainly are missing the big picture, but i'm sure you're not the only one. the long and the short of it, is that google adwords *work*. maybe not on you and your friends, but in the big picture, they do. microsoft understands this.
google hit the advertising "holy grail" with adwords -- although no one has said/realized it, adwords are what the marketing industry has been wishing for since freud's nephew invented it -- specific and contextual advertising.
before adwords, advertisers mostly had to throw a bunch of shit at the wall and hope that some stuck. billboards and subway ads are a good example. anybody and everybody sees that ad, so if you have a niche or specific market, you have to advertise to 10k people to get to your 100.
radio and newspapers are a bit better -- if you want to advertise your new cat food, you can call the publishers of "cat fancy", and hit closer to the bulls' eye.
adwords allow advertising to a demographic of one. if you sell gloves that are missing the middle finger on one hand (for people who've lost that finger), you could theoretically dial in your adwords to catch that person.
adwords and gmail make it even more powerful. now, instead of catching people who are actively searching the web, you can just filter their email.
i use gmail, and i have actually clicked on a few adwords because i had sent an email to someone asking if they had xyz for sale, and the adwords threw up a link to an online store that did.
adwords are NOT banner ads. they're specific, they're not obnoxiousm, and they work. this is the piece of the pie microsoft wants to in on, and they're trying to acquire yahoo (at least their traffic) to do it.
i may be going too far here, but if they don't get yahoo, they're going to lose out on the (consumer) desktop in a big way -- is there a part of their business that isn't slipping?
mr c
yes. this is exactly my point. there is no good solution. so 79% of the internet population will suffer to protect 20% from the bad 1%
it just gets dystopian from there . . .
mr c
before i get modded to hell, i'm usually not a doomsdayer.
however, i think this may be the point that we have all been dreading since the internet began -- the day we have to provide *real* identification to get access to casual (non commerce) sites.
i guess the glass-half-full part of me is wondering how facebook can verify age without compromising anonymity (and convenience for that matter).
one way to address this is to not allow unverified people to network with minors (what adults really would, anyway, unless they're spying on them or, well, the pedophiles this system is trying to address). although this is a bit ageist in that this would require minors to provide real id. this doesn't actually address the issue, only postpones full-compliance to future generations. . .
so, yeah. once this becomes commonplace (ie. when the infrastructure is in place), i can see the day when we all have to show our (real) ID at the door of every site we go to.
often it occurs to me that i will be looking back to these days and think, "wow, those were the days when the internet was free," as i hold my nationalIDcard up to the computer screen to be scanned . . .
mr c
point taken, i suppose i should have disclaimed, "tubes have high voltages that can kill," etc.
but really, just use the "only one hand in the amp at a time" rule, and you'll be fine. 400V isn't really *that* much, and as long as it doesn't go through the heart, think of it as electricity teaching you a lesson not to fu** with it that you will not soon forget.
i started on old fender amps that ran a rather high voltage, and having respect for it from the beginning has kept me from ever getting shocked.
i mean, what did kids that wanted to learn electronics before the 1950's do?
mr c
had you had engineering physics II (electric and magnetic theory)? the stuff in circuits makes much more sense if you've had the physics/calculus -- because then it makes sense why a capacitor integrates voltage and an inductor differentiates it.
or why a LRC circuit is a 2nd order diff eq.
but i've found that doing engineering-type circuit analysis and working on bang and olufsen receivers (eg) take place in two completely different areas of the brain.
fwiw, i've found the water pipe analogy is fairly useful: voltage is the water pressure, current is the rate of water flow, and resistance is faucet. power is what happens when the jet of water turns a wheel, and is made up of both pressure (voltage) and flow (current).
i suppose if you could control a large faucet with a small flow of water in a separate pipe, that would be a tube or transistor.
a check valve would be a diode and -- ok, i should stop.
mr c
The better the quality, the simpler and easier the circuit.
Get a receiver or amp that has a problem and mess with it. A receiver in "protect mode" is a good one since that pretty much means that you have a DC offset on the output. A bi-polar amp will drive you nuts, since *any* bad component will throw DC onto the output, but you'll learn a ton going through it. A mosfet amp is much simpler since they are more like tube amps in topology. Hell, for that matter, try to get ahold of an old tube amp. They are very simple and are a good way to get yer feet wet.
Or an old cassette deck, like an old Nakamichi. Nobody wants them anymore (and they shouldn't, either), but they have a lot of cool control/motor circuitry in them. Especially if you get a hold of one that's discrete -- ie, all the logic and control is done with transistors.
and get the service manual -- it'll have schematics and sometimes theory of operation.
Oh yeah, the advice for the Navy Manuals is right on. Those are the clearest and most comprehensive books on the subject.
mr c
does this mean that the glossy screens aren't polarized?
-cd
has anyone tried converting a glossy to a matte? i'm thinking 1200 grit sandpaper might do the trick.
all the screens in my life are matte, so i've not a reason to try this.
mr c
"education mall"? really? only a politician who is trying to line his pockets could come up with something like this.
this has less to do with making libraries urban hangouts than subsidizing the shops that are now going into them.
even knowledge/education is a commodity/industry in america.
teachers will be called "knowledge technicians"
mr c
took mine with a motu traveler for recording in venice, berlin and kolobzeg. rock solid, even when recording a large rocksteady ska band. the aluminum case helps "ruggedfy" it, and the powersupply autosenses 220v. very small and light, and you should be able to pick one up fairly cheap now.
i still can't understand why apple dropped the 12" laptop form.
mr c
sure, but what you explain is "processing", not "personality". while there are certainly differences between death and sleep, my point was that personality doesn't go *anywhere*. when the power is pulled, the lights go off. perhaps there is something akin to a "saved state" as you say, but that's the best case scenario -- and this saved state deteriorates quickly after the moment of death.
mr c
or where any "personality" goes when it's sleeping.
mr c
you know, i think this very thing every time i see an apple article on /. -- which constitute a good 20% of them. on the other hand, apple is responsible for most of what is exciting in computing/technology right now.
mr c
i had a short clip from the film "the cabinet of dr. caligari" on youtube with some music that i produced. it was recently taken down by the request of Friedrich-Wilhelm-Murnau-Stiftung -- which as far as i could tell distributed the film. Of course, the film, being made in the early 1900's is in the public domain, as far as i can tell. so i think this guy knew that youtube had to take it down, no questions asked, and sent them a DMCA letter.
i responded to youtube, this is what they sent back:
the counter-notification procedure is outlined here:
google support
the worrisome bit is that i become liable if i am found to "knowingly infringe". this means that if this guys lawyers can show that i knew that it infringed, then i am liable for their costs. what happens if i win? nothing. either way, i'm at risk of paying money. especially since i would probably need to get my own lawyer if i were to pursue the issue.
it sucks. this guy is bluffing, and effectively asserting copyright control over something that is in the public domain (unless he legally got the rights somehow).
and it's just not a priority in my life right now. i just happen to really dig the film, and was working on a soundtrack for it, and then i posted one of the clips to youtube.
mr c.
it seems that the ipods of the future will not be simple music players. they will do video et al from itunes.
an interesting question, is will all ipods in the future be more like the iphone, running os x and wifi? i guess it comes down to how much they can pack into one for the price -- also, the backwards-thinking cell companies would prevent a super low priced iphone. . .
it would be cool to have an unlimited data plan for your ipod in some sort of hassle free deal -- maybe $30 to at&t could get you dsl and unlimited 3g access . . . . (although i won't be switching to an iphone any time soon since i get 500 minutes + unlimited data with sprint for $30/mo)
mr c
you're exactly right. the only thing that really interests me about the iphone is that it's a phone that works with my mac. it really does suck that there isn't a standard of some sort for sync'ing cell phones to pc's. the iphone is really just a vendor lock-in option for mac fanboys like myself. mac people and linux people usually get along since apple seems to support a lot of *nix standards.
mr c
viewing websites on my current cell phone is a very lynx-esque experience -- arrowing between various links on the page, the pressing enter.
i have downloaded "mobile" versions of gmail and google maps for my cell phone.
i just don't see that this is a big deal. besides, to me, the most attractive thing about the iphone is that it will perfectly sync with my mac -- address book, calendar, itunes, iphoto, etc.
mr c
yes, but the problem is not high prices of fuel per se -- it's the lack of infrastructure. the big car/tire companies bought and dismantled the public transit system of many major american cities years ago. consequently, many people rely on their cars to commute to work. in addition, everybody here STILL insists on driving the largest car possible. it's weird.
in st louis, the public transit system is essentially broken. i will say that i've noticed many more scooters on the street since gas hit $3/gal, however.
mr c
and this:
i'm not a grammar nazi, but 180 degree contradiction makes the whole summary meaningless. . .
mr c