Author: Isaac

Categories
technology

TV on my mac update

Everything is still going well. I had been getting annoyed over the jagginess I was getting while watching hockey on my 2006 macbook. I figured that the integrated graphics just weren’t up to decoding the HD stream on the fly.

I fiddled around a bit tonight and found a solution. It turns out that the jagginess only occurred at certain window sizes in the viewer. Well, at most sizes really. I’m assuming that at certain image sizes there is less interpolation going on and therefore less processing by my wimpy graphics chipset. Once I found the sweet spot, the image quality was quite a bit better and the game was much more enjoyable There is still a fair amount of smearing on the action, but I’ll forgive my computer that issue. I’m assuming that once I go to a new computer, with a real graphics card, there will be no more problems with the TV stream.

Categories
science

Climategate

Wow… all I can say is, wow. For those of you living in a cave or getting your news from TV, climategate has really rattled the global warming orthodoxy around the world. What is climategate? A whole slew of emails and code were either leaked or hacked from CRU, one of the most influential data centers in the world when it comes to global warming data.

The emails are an embarrassment. In them we read about people conspiring to keep dissenting views from being accepted into reputable journals, gnashing of teeth over why they can’t explain the lack of warming, and possibly the effort to delete information that had been requested through freedom of information requests.

As damaging as the emails are, the more serious bits of the release consist of the code used to make the final temperature results used by the the IPCC and many others for policy considerations. At best, the code looks manipulative, at worst, it looks fraudulent. It is littered with comments by programmers that essentially say that the adjustments being made are totally artificial. We’ll see what happens as the code is examined more closely. The head of the CRU has already stepped down while this is being investigated and the UK MET office (closely attached to the CRU) has announced that it will release all the data and redo the calculations for the last 160 years. If they had done that 6 months ago there wouldn’t be such a scandal now.

Those of you that have read my blog for a while know about my skepticism about anthropological global warming. All of that has been based around the sloppy statistical methods and data secrecy involved with the most prominent global warming folks. If nothing else, I hope that these documents will show that this “settled” science seems to rest on some pretty shaky ground. If you don’t believe me, surely you can trust John Stewart, right?

And here’s something from that hotbed of right wing conspiracies, the CBC…

If you’d like to read what has been published, you can find it here.

Categories
technology

Geeking out

I got my FIOS installed last night. OMG! Not only do I now have internet in my house, it is freaking amazing. My downloads are silly fast and webpages open up almost instantly. Youtube is a revelation…

I also got a TV package. There’s a digital cable box in my room but I don’t have a TV. I am watching TV on my laptop computer. ON. MY. COMPUTER!!! This may be old hat for some of you guys, but I think it’s awesome. All I needed was a firewire cable connecting my box and my computer and a few free programs. Now I have HDTV on my computer. Seems to me that I should be able to record this, but I haven’t figured out how yet.

I may never leave my room again… 🙂

Categories
art photography technology

"But what does my picture really look like?"

That’s a question I got a lot when I sold photo gear and I’m still getting it now. Last night, a lady was comparing the regular glossy screen to the anti-glare one on the laptops. They do look different but she was distressed because she didn’t know which one was “right.”

*PISH* Give me a color slide any day:-) Seriously, there is something satisfying about making a physical object that actually exists. Making a string of numbers whose appearance varies considerably depending on how it is rendered just doesn’t feel the same. Or maybe I’m just old fashioned.

I do think that the analog still has a place in this world, even if it’s only in the way people think about stuff. Are we hard wired to think in an analog fashion about certain things or is it just the way we were taught?

Categories
Uncategorized

This should be the last Monday

… That I have to go to the library to get on the Internet. If all
goes well, the Fios guys will be here next Monday (sometime between 8
and 5 grrr…) and I’ll be happily surfing away on super speed
Internet. I should also be able to watch TV on my computer assuming
that my poor MacBook will be up to it. I can’t wait to rejoin the
modern world, only one week to go!

Sent from my iPod

Categories
Uncategorized

Film and sunk costs

I picked up all of my film when I last went to mom’s place. It’s an
impressive amount, close to 200 rolls. They were meant to be used in
Yemen but the logistics proved too difficult to be practical.

So what am I going to do with it? I still love shooting film, and I
still have nice equipment for doing that, but am I really going to
shoot that much? Some might say that since I spent the money on the
film it would be silly not to use it. I think a more rational way of
looking at it is to realize that money is gone and just look at the
costs involved in going forward.

The big problem is that the film is color. It would cost a ton to get
it developed and scanned. If it were B&W, I’d probably hang onto it. I
enjoy the process of developing B&W film and it’s a far sight cheaper
to develop to boot.

I think using the money that it would cost to develop all that film
would be better used on a new… digital camera. I know, I can hardly
believe it myself. What, you think i’d be without a decent camera? The
thing is that there are finally some good digital cameras that I think
I’d like to use. Plus, many of them are also HD camcorders, it would
be nice to try some more movie stuff after all these years. The new
Panasonic would be the safe bet, but I’m mighty intrigued with the new
Ricoh.

So the time has come. I’m going to hang on to several of my cooler
film cameras, but I’m ready to make the switch. Anyone need a bunch of
120 and 35mm film?

Sent from my iPodl

Categories
Uncategorized

Pavement

Wilco was, for a long time, a group that I enjoyed but never craved. I
owned all of their albums but I never really understood them. Then one
night while I was in Yemen, everything clicked and I’ve been truly
hooked ever since.

I wonder if something similar has happened with Pavement and me. There
are people whose musical tastes I trust that think that Pavement is
the most brilliant group ever. I could see the appeal in a slacker-
rock kind of way but I never really got into them.

Tonight, I heard their song “Brink of the Clouds/Candylad” off of
their album “Wowee Zowee” and I think I understand why they may indeed
be one of those great bands. They had me from the begining when they
started by yelling “Johnathan Peel!!!” When they went into the “He’s a
candylad, he’s a lad made of candy,” bit I nearly fell out of my bed I
was laughing so hard. I had been missing out on the humor of their
music, it makes a lot more sense now. I think I’ll give “Korea Korea”
another listen and see how late I’ll stay up rediscovering their music.

Sent from my iPod

Categories
Uncategorized

I’m getting Internet!!!

But not until the 30th. Everyone said that I’d go nuts without it and
they were eventually right. I probably would have been able to wait a
bit longer except my job involves using and telling other people to
use the Internet all the time. I can’t wait to rejoin the digital
world!!

Sent from my iPod

Categories
freedom

The Berlin Wall

It fell 20 years ago today. I really am amazed at how quickly the cold war seems to have been forgotten. This was probably the biggest event in my lifetime and it still resonates with me now. Surely an event worth commemorating.

Categories
Uncategorized

Testing

Nothing to see here, just testing something out.

Sent from my iPod