...more recent posts
Selected "Astronomy pictures of the day" (index): here, here, here, here, here, and here. Plus this big one of Mars.
Mark Pesce weighs in on the Sony Playstation II
"Doing the math, this 3-D revision of Moore's Law predicts that every five years computer graphics should improve in performance a thousandfold. My own experience over the last half-decade confirms this.... Alvy Ray Smith, one of the pioneers of computer graphics (now toiling away at Microsoft's research lab), told Howard Rheingold that 'reality is eighty million polygons a second.' To re-create scenes indistinguishable from reality, the computer needs to send that many of the tiny triangles to the screen. We're less than two years away from reaching that target, and there's no sign that things are slowing down."
The end of rapid technological change? Intriguing argument. (from HTP)
"It's important for us to explain to our nation that life is important. It's not only life of babies, but it's life of children living in, you know, the dark dungeons of the Internet."--Arlington Heights, Ill., Oct. 24, 2000Huh? Dark dungeons? Does he mean that thing with the dragons and the funny dice? That's so pre-internet, but I guess he's got the right social group. Come to think of it, I seem to remember my mother warning me about Dungeons and Dragons as well. If only I had gotten into it, I'd probably be some sort of unix wizard by now, writing obfuscated one line perl programs to calculate the amount of hit point damage my stock options could do against a heavily armed phalanx of suited capitalists. Instead I wasted many years trying to fit in and kiss girls. Oh well.
Is Kid-A the pro-Napster argument the industry can't deny?
I grew up as a Red Sox fan. Not just a casual fan, I was one of the Fenway faithful. I loved the Bo Sox. Fred Lynn, Jim Rice, Dwight Evans, Carleton Fisk, Luis Tiant, Rick Burelson (sp?), Butch Hobson, George Scott, Jerry Remey, Bill Lee (!), Carl Yastremski... These were the big league heros I grew up on. So I'm sure it would come as quite a shock to some of my playground pals that I now live in New York, and while I'm certainly not so fixated on baseball, I do route for the Yankees when it comes down to it. The Yankees! How could this be you ask? Those spoilers of so many Red Sox dreams. Those evil tyrants of the A.L. East. Those Bronx Bullies. My defense rests on the head (and what a head it is) of one man. A man who thoroughly signifies baseball - if not through his deeds at least through his posture - Don Zimmer. That's right, Joe Torre's right hand man, and former Red Sox head coach. The man who, at least for me, ties it all together. From the always losing Sox, to the never fail Yankees, it's really Don Zimmer I've been routing for all along. See? There's no conflict. So congratulations to the Don, and the rest of the Yanks. Now no more baseball talk for a year.
November 3rd is my new "committed" installation date for DSL from Verizon. The email actually said, "All previously received committed delivery
dates, if any, should be considered canceled." To (sort of) quote the princess bride: "You keep using that word 'committed,' I do not think it means what you think it means."
Forget the elections. Vote for something really important.
Microsoft cracked. I guess it's big news because everyone has it.
Here's an in depth first look at the Apple's long awaited new DV codec (it's part of the new Quicktime 5.0.) Seems like they're making good progress.