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Great time last night. I hope this becomes the tradition it is shaping up to be. A little wobbly this morning, but I agree with Alex that it must be that sunspot.
Oh how I wish I had been taping the conversation that was flying at the Local. Bill, Alex, Steve and Tom were dropping some serious science. Our one guest seemed quite well versed in modern music, art, and philosophy, but I'm not sure he fully realized who he was tangling with. I've always been impressed by the level of conversation, but I'm moving toward evangelist. You guys rock.
In the brief part of the conversation where I knew anything about what was being said we did some talking about XML. The link I posted yesterday seemed to have lit a light bulb or two. Here's the offical Tim Berners-lee "Semantic Web roadmap." That's the view from "20,000 feet." Here's the view from 50,000 feet which will fill in any gaps in your knowledge of the pre-semantic web.
Perhaps more interesting, here is Jorn Barger's (of robotwisdon fame) nicely to-the-point argument for why all of this will never work. I love the start: "Every undergrad, encountering Artifical Intelligence for the first time, imagines they can solve its central
problem... until they actually try it."
Great time last night. I hope this becomes the tradition it is shaping up to be. A little wobbly this morning, but I agree with Alex that it must be that sunspot.
Oh how I wish I had been taping the conversation that was flying at the Local. Bill, Alex, Steve and Tom were dropping some serious science. Our one guest seemed quite well versed in modern music, art, and philosophy, but I'm not sure he fully realized who he was tangling with. I've always been impressed by the level of conversation, but I'm moving toward evangelist. You guys rock.
In the brief part of the conversation where I knew anything about what was being said we did some talking about XML. The link I posted yesterday seemed to have lit a light bulb or two. Here's the offical Tim Berners-lee "Semantic Web roadmap." That's the view from "20,000 feet." Here's the view from 50,000 feet which will fill in any gaps in your knowledge of the pre-semantic web.
Perhaps more interesting, here is Jorn Barger's (of robotwisdon fame) nicely to-the-point argument for why all of this will never work. I love the start: "Every undergrad, encountering Artifical Intelligence for the first time, imagines they can solve its central
problem... until they actually try it."
The best part of the fine print governing acceptable uses of my shell account (italics are mine):
"Don't run software that does not relate to the use of the account for web document publishing. Network diagnostics are related, as are report generating tools. Running programs to calculate the mass of an electron does not qualify as an acceptable use."D'oh.
The best part of the fine print governing acceptable uses of my shell account (italics are mine):
"Don't run software that does not relate to the use of the account for web document publishing. Network diagnostics are related, as are report generating tools. Running programs to calculate the mass of an electron does not qualify as an acceptable use."D'oh.
Here's a very detailed beginner level look at XML and the semantic web. Basically no previous knowledge is expected, and that's hard to claim for most of this type of writing. Probably I've said it before about some other article, but this is a good one to start with.
Here's a very detailed beginner level look at XML and the semantic web. Basically no previous knowledge is expected, and that's hard to claim for most of this type of writing. Probably I've said it before about some other article, but this is a good one to start with.
Some hard drive news this morning. Bet you can't wait. IBM has released a new 48 gigabyte 2.5 inch drive. This is the ultra slim size necessary for small portable computers, and 48 gigs is a nice jump in size. And not only is this the biggest drive in its size, IBM is also claiming it is the most quiet. This is very good news for small notebook owners who have been somewhat limited in storage options.
And if you can't get enough space inside your machine (and let's face it, 48 gigs is nice, but still not enough for some) then you have to go external. And if you've been waiting to make that jump, then you might be interested to know that the new Oxford 911 firewire bridge chipset is making its way into external firewire drives. These things are fast. OWC has external cases utilizing the new chipset and packaged with IBM's totally amazing GXP series drives (3.5 inch in 60 and 75 gig sizes.) I have one of these IBM drives (internally, not in the firewire case) and can attest to their complete butt kickingness. This is the drive for your MP3 collection.
Some hard drive news this morning. Bet you can't wait. IBM has released a new 48 gigabyte 2.5 inch drive. This is the ultra slim size necessary for small portable computers, and 48 gigs is a nice jump in size. And not only is this the biggest drive in its size, IBM is also claiming it is the most quiet. This is very good news for small notebook owners who have been somewhat limited in storage options.
And if you can't get enough space inside your machine (and let's face it, 48 gigs is nice, but still not enough for some) then you have to go external. And if you've been waiting to make that jump, then you might be interested to know that the new Oxford 911 firewire bridge chipset is making its way into external firewire drives. These things are fast. OWC has external cases utilizing the new chipset and packaged with IBM's totally amazing GXP series drives (3.5 inch in 60 and 75 gig sizes.) I have one of these IBM drives (internally, not in the firewire case) and can attest to their complete butt kickingness. This is the drive for your MP3 collection.
Sitting here at my desk I can look out the window (assuming I open the blinds which I will admit often doesn't happen) and see the World Trade Center. No, I can't see Bill's office; he's on the other side. But I can see the thing. Bam. Right there. If I go up on the roof, and stand precariously close to the front right corner of the building, and crane my neck just right, I can also see the Empire State Building and the very top (damn you Red Square) of the Chrysler Building.
Why am I mentioning this? Well, every time I see these behemoths I think "why doesn't someone start offering two way wireless broadband served off the top of one of these giant things?" It's almost like they were made for this purpose. All you would need is a line of sight (see above) and a small satellite type dish (something the size of a direct TV dish,) and you'd be cruising in style. Forget you're puny DSL line (well, unless you've got the 1.5 Mb/s connection,) this thing will fly. And while I'm still going to maintain that NYC kicks butt, it's one of those other places that is going to get this first. Chicago, to be exact. Chicago? There must be some political BS going on somewhere because the idea that Manhattan (very small area, very dense, very wealthy, tech oriented population) is not the test bed for some sort of wireless broadband seems completely crazy. Let's see: a couple of ten million extremely affluent consumers with little to no choice in a service they'd be willing to pay close to $100/month for? Hello? Somebody please come take our money. Except not you Verizon. You stink.
Sitting here at my desk I can look out the window (assuming I open the blinds which I will admit often doesn't happen) and see the World Trade Center. No, I can't see Bill's office; he's on the other side. But I can see the thing. Bam. Right there. If I go up on the roof, and stand precariously close to the front right corner of the building, and crane my neck just right, I can also see the Empire State Building and the very top (damn you Red Square) of the Chrysler Building.
Why am I mentioning this? Well, every time I see these behemoths I think "why doesn't someone start offering two way wireless broadband served off the top of one of these giant things?" It's almost like they were made for this purpose. All you would need is a line of sight (see above) and a small satellite type dish (something the size of a direct TV dish,) and you'd be cruising in style. Forget you're puny DSL line (well, unless you've got the 1.5 Mb/s connection,) this thing will fly. And while I'm still going to maintain that NYC kicks butt, it's one of those other places that is going to get this first. Chicago, to be exact. Chicago? There must be some political BS going on somewhere because the idea that Manhattan (very small area, very dense, very wealthy, tech oriented population) is not the test bed for some sort of wireless broadband seems completely crazy. Let's see: a couple of ten million extremely affluent consumers with little to no choice in a service they'd be willing to pay close to $100/month for? Hello? Somebody please come take our money. Except not you Verizon. You stink.