Final Post!

Tom's Hardware Article

London to Turn 'Every Lamppost' into WiFi Hotspot

Well, as a proud resident of one of the most forward thinking areas of the world, the cradle of technology between SF and the Silicon Valley, I'm ashamed to say we don't have this yet. Really. Wifi for everyone?! How do we, here in the heart of tech progress, not have this rolled out yet? They're going to beat us to it, the damn brits.

You see, I understand that with the great things that democracy can bring us, it always drags along with it bureaucracy. That means that usually the right things get done, but it takes ages. And that might be okay in other parts of society, but when it comes to technology, it's pretty bad. When computers go obsolete in less than 2 years, we can't wait around for the FCC to approve of measure in 5. These aren't dog years -- they're worse. They're Moore years -- as in Moore's Law, which states that microprocessors can double its transistors every 18 months. He hasn't been wrong these past few decades.

So, I do love that I see solar panel roofs and parking meters here and there, that we have a great amount of commerce and a safe (mostly) place to raise our kids... but I do feel like we as such a progressive state are being held back by the slow moving machine that is D.C. Sure, they're not entirely to blame for making the people who want free wifi available in our big cities (from providers like Google, no less), but I'm sure that government from high up to the local level are way more obstructive than helpful. I'm sure no one wants a monopoly from the deal, but I don't think spreading the greatness of this essential utility is anything but altruistic. It's information, to go online and find out more about our world, through wikipedia, through government sites, through all the great news sources... it really is essential in this day and age. And the people that would benefit most of all would be the poor, who can't afford to pay internet month-to-month, and could just buy a cheap netbook and get started. A foot into the world community is a good step forward.

Tom's Hardware Article:

Toyota's First Hydrogen Car to Cost $50,000

The article specifies that there isn't really a car that will be released soon, just that Toyota is going to wait until the costs of a H2 car must be under $50 grand before they will sell them. Currently, it would cost a customer approx. $1 million to buy a H2 car.

What I think here is that, yes, the advancing tech in automobiles is great. And even better, they are greener, and safer. But really, what I think is many of the people don't understand some of the basic science behind some of these innovations. This 'hydrogen' car is actually hydrogen fuel cell. Which is pretty much somehow making H2 charge and run batteries that will power electric motors to run cars.

Is it me, or are they creating extra steps? Hydrogen, as a flammable and explosive gas, has the potential energy to combust and power an internal combustion engine -- just like gasoline. The only difference? Combustion of hydrogen gas only produces 2 substances as discharge: pure water, and oxygen. Sounds like a win-win to me. Why make the whole maze and round-about of creating batteries of hydrogen, which then power motors, which then move the car? Just make the engines run off of hydrogen!

A while ago, there was a farmer who had his 2 trucks run off of water. The contraption he had in the beds of the trucks would extract the hydrogen from the purified water, then use the hydrogen in a slightly modified engine in the truck. The thing got like 75 miles to a gallon of hydrogen. Then, of course, soon after the local news aired the story, the man mysteriously dies of poisoning. Sounds like the men in black from Big Oil got to him, before they destroyed their multi-trillion dollar industry.

I think people with this kind of ingenuity should be at the forefront of our development. Not the greedy politician, not the aloof tech-heads... but honest-to-goodness, sensible people with a bright idea and the basic know-how of things. We really already have the technology -- it's the people with large amounts of money they are afraid to lose, that are crippling our progress.

Nintendo vs. Apple

Tom's Article

In this article, the president of Nintendo Satoru Iwata told his senior executives that Apple is their new and upcoming enemy.

I personally see what he is thinking. They are both targetting primarily the same customer group -- which is the casual, non-tech-savvy individuals who are looking for easy play entertainment. The Nintendo Wii is the most popular game console of this generation, and it is because it targets kids na casual gamers. Likewise, Iwata understands that the Apple iPod and iPhones also target this group, with their numerous games and apps. What I think the president of Nintendo fails to see is that Facebook games trump both of these platforms. I mean, if you have over 400 million users on Facebook, and even if 1% of them play a game... well, that's over 4 million users right there. It's ridiculous. That's why those little facebook apps might seem trivial, but man are they big money right now.

Seriously, I'd love to jump on that bandwagon. That's kind of why I'd want to be done with this degree program, and get out there and make my own stuff, and make money now. I'm really overflowing with ideas, and the only fear is that the academy is not going to teach me how to implement them. I mean, it's great that I can model a person in Maya in 3D, but that's not really gonna help me be a 1-man show and create a facebook app and make myself an easy 100 grand.

Of course, I realize that programming is something (especially as a dedicated 3d artist) that I need to learn in my own time, but my own department head told me to not even think about Java or programming right now, and if I have any extra time on my hands, I should be drawing more or Maya'ing more. Which is something I might have a problem motivating myself to do at any rate. I'm just a jumbled mess really.

Either way, there's a market out there right now, little tapped and just waiting to be exploited. In a good way. Profitably. :D

Tom's Hardware Posting Biological Article (Contraception)

For Tom's Hardware Article

I guess this belongs on the tech site, because it concerns ol' Bill Gates, but it's still a little strange to see anyways.

As for the many comments at the bottom of the article denouncing the direction that the this philanthropist is going... I have to disagree with most of them. Seriously, over-population in developing (and perhaps not-so-developing) countries need all the help they can get. It's because of the prohibitive cost of per use contraception that has kept it from being used widely in poorer countries. Even handing out free condoms is not an end-all solution. What those people need is something like a vaccine, a one-shot deal that can protect for months or years. And the article is stating that it's using just ultrasound, which can be so harmless you can use it on the fetuses of unborn babies.

I can see no downside the this type of technology. Sure, it sounds scary when its untested, and the thought of becoming permanently sterile does induce something terrifying. But if its successful, wow, the benefits would be... revolutionary. On a world-wide scale. I mean, I'm a sexually active guy, and although I try to be as careful as I can, there are times when I wish I didn't have to use contraception like a condom, or making sure the girl is using something. Then there's the whole mood/ interruption thing, when you're taking those vital few moments to stop and do the right thing. Which, I guess, is something one should do, regardless of contraception! But all joking aside, it would make so many peoples' lives so much better.... for such a small thing. This really is a great idea.

The only real downside I think would be the many men that would just assume that conception is the entire concern, and would forget about STDs. Even if this were to be a successful scientific break-through, diseases could still be transferred through unprotected sex. Really is a scary world out there, sometimes.

The New Type of Thief

So there's this article on how Avatar broke all Blu-Ray sales records... and also pirating sales records.

Tom's Hardware article

Now, there's a strange and disconcerting trend among many of the savvy PC users these days. Put simply, they have an entitlement complex. They reason that if they don't like the product (whether it be movies, music, game, software), they shouldn't have to pay for it. And the only way they would know before they purchase that product... is to pirate it. In some twisted way, they justify it in their minds.

What a load of crap. Perhaps I'm taking more offense at this type of attitude than usual because soon, I will be part of the group of people that produce these things, as well as consume them. And it's going to hurt people like me, and many of my friends. That's firstly.

As for dismantling the flawed logic these self-centered geeks have, it's simple: we can use any other type of product for this example, so let's use food. By their logic, one should be able to walk into any restaurant, and eat for free. And if at the end of their entire meal, if they didn't think the meal was worth the price listed, they could simply walk out the door without paying. If they somehow thought it was good enough, they would pay. Does this in any way sound reasonable? What about clothing ("it didn't get me enough dates, I don't think i'm going to pay for this shirt"), jewelry ("this didn't have the luster I thought it would, I'll just keep it for free"), anything.

Pirating is stealing. It's simple as that. Why these people have an easier time justifying it is because it's all so out of sight, out of mind. They download the media, and it's there. It doesn't feel like stealing to them. It's the same thing as walking into a local Best Buy, picking up a few movies, putting them under your shirt, and walking out the door. And maybe out of the 4 movies they steal, if they would like 1... would they really walk back to the store the next day, and say, "Hey I stole this movie yesterday, and it was actually pretty good. So, here's the money. Thanks!"

It's unbelievable. Of course, I'm sure everyone at one point or another has been tempted, or even done a little downloading of a song or two. But the normal person would feel at least some kind of remorse for it. It's the community of people with this twisted sense of entitlement that bother me. I mean, I have downloaded stuff, but it's pretty much TV show episode that I have missed, something I can see for free on Hulu or on television. And even then, I sometimes feel bad. I don't understand how these people continue not only to do what they do, but then spout this nonsense as if they have a right to do it.

All black is depressing

I really should change the color scheme of this blog.

Journal - THG APR 5 Article

Article -- Apple Moves Over 300,000 iPads on Launch Day

I was walking from WonderCon in the Moscone center in San Francisco over the weekend, and wondered at this line that was formed downtown. As I got closer, I realized that this long line out the door of this store was extending from the Apple store, and it hit me that these people were waiting to buy the iPad.

Now, I do admit that I'm pretty biased against Apple in general, but that's for another story. Aside from that, even looking at this in as neutral a light as I possibly can, I still cannot see how this new toy can garner this much attention. Is it the first tablet computer ever created? No. Does it factor in new hardware and add functionality in a new way? No. Can it even make phone calls? No. There are so many No's in my own list of what it couldn't do, that I figured I should have made a shorter mental list of what it could do.

What I could only assume is all these people in line were the opposite of me; these people loved Apple and would buy almost anything Apple made. Even with that broken logic, I can't accept it. The iPad is ugly. Its bezel is big, an eyesore. The entire thing really doesn't have any aesthetic appeal, unlike it's smaller and sleeker iPod / iPhone brethren. The thing just looks like an oversized digital photo frame. And really, it doesn't do all that much more than the photo frames.

So the company manages to move 300 thousand of these useless things in a day. Well, that's remarkable that you could sell that many of these things, at half a grand each, that nobody really needs. That, I think, is the real story here. The American endless hunger for pointless consumption.