Chiron Bramberger's Blog

Amazing Brain Story

2010-11-02T14:58:00.000-07:00

Imagine you're the guy working the MRI machine when this pops out:

This is a guy with a job as a civil servant. He's got a family, wife, kids, the whole deal.

He's in there because he's having "mild weakness" in his left leg.

So they take a look inside his brains and find something you'd expect on an episode of The Simpsons.

The pictures on the left are of him, and for comparison, a normal person's brain on the right. See all that stuff in side? That's what makes us go. But the guy on the left has a giant pocket of cerebrospinal fluid (brain juice) and a thin layer of brains all around.

"Even more amazingly, the man's IQ score is 75, which according to the DSM-IV TR (the manual used by mental health clinicians to diagnose disorders) is on the high end of mild mental retardation."

For reference, Forrest Gump's character in the eponymous film was supposed to have about the same IQ.

Think about it - this guy has almost no brain. But like, apparently it's fine. Imagine if I cut out like 90% of your laptop. Would it even turn on? No. No it wouldn't. But somehow, life, even when given almost nothing, somehow manages to create thought and life and love. Out of like almost no brains.

taken from here:

http://www.mentalhelp.net/poc/view_doc.php?type=doc&id=28702&cn=72

Oh oh oh, and what about the girl with the GPA of 94.7, all while running on half a brain!

taken from here:

http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/story?id=125948&page=1

Somehow, neuroplasticity just doesn't do it justice.

Brain shapes life, life shapes brain, and round and round we go.

What to do when you're suffering.

2010-09-14T22:51:00.000-07:00

I recently read a post on Facebook where someone I knew had written something like this:

"Please don't ask why, but I'm feeling really upset and would love some kind words. I know it will help. Thank you."

I just happened to see this at the right time, and banged out a reply. But after reading it, I decided to re-post on my blog here, in case it's in any way helpful or interesting to anyone. I just typed it off the top of my head, so I'm sorry if I could have written it better. I hope it's alright. :-)

----------

Okay, so, there are these kids that have a neurological disorder where they don't feel pain. Ever. You know what happens to them? They die; By the time they are 12 years old or so - they just don't make it. Why? Since they can't feel pain, it doesn't occur to them that they have injuries or have broken bones. As a result, they die from random complications, like in infection, because it never occurs to them that something is wrong.

Now, think about someone *you* care about. Someone you would die for if it could save them. Like you'd donate a heart to them. I feel this way for friends and family. Now, although I hate it when they are in pain, in some way, if they couldn't feel pain, if I took that away from them, then after about 10 years they would be dead.

So, in some way, if you love them, you wouldn't want to take away their ability to feel pain or they would die.

There's someone else that loves you this much. Your body. When your body creates the experience of pain, it's your body's way of telling you what's wrong. It's your body's way of telling you to pay attention. It your body's way of saying "hey you, don't die!". In fact, it's your body's way of saying I Love You.

So life, is wise. One outcome of life's wisdom is pain. It's a part of life. But it's life's, and your body's way of telling you it's loves you.

Now here's the trick. The brain can't do too many things at the same time. it's like a computer running too many programs. So, when you try to do too much of something with your mind, it runs out of it's "computer power". So, if you do something that engages your brain, your brain doesn't have any computing power to run the "pain" program. They let burn patients play virtual reality video games and found that they reported great reductions in pain - better than some drugs.

So what's the point? Well! There's another trick.

Life is hard and complicated. In fact, some Buddhists say "Life is suffering." But they don't mean that in a negative way. They are trying to say that life is complicated and if it were easy that would create its' own problems. And without pain, you'd die (remember above?)

So Life is suffering, but what is suffering? I believe suffering is a special combination of *pain* plus *fear*.

Now, suffering sucks. But pain can be managed. Thinking a lot or doing something that really involved your mind can steal away the energy required to create pain.

But fear, well here we have another secret weapon. It's impossible for the brain to be in a state of appreciate and fear at the same time.

So when we are appreciative of something, it's hard to be afraid. Our brains can't do both at the same time - one process really screws up the other.

Now we get to the ultimate trick. Life is wise. Life is suffering. When you are suffering you need a trick.

Remember, fear + pain = suffering. So, here's the trick.

Life is wise. Life is suffering. But suffering needs fear to turn pain into suffering. So, since you know your body creates pain to protect and love you, and you know pain is hard to do when your brain is busy doing other things, this is the trick.

Thank your body and your brain for your pain. Just say it to yourself. "Thank you for the pain, because I know that you are just trying to protect because you love me. Thank you for loving me"

When you do this, you're busy thinking something that's hard to think about when you're in pain, so you're starving your brain for computer power to create pain. Now you've turned down the pain.

Second, when the distraction is based on appreciating your body and brain, and thanking them for loving you, you're turning down the fear.

Finally, by turning down both the pain, and the fear, you've broken up the suffering. There is no suffering now, only less pain and lots of appreciation.

So, this can apply to anything that's happening in your life, because emotional pain and physical pain are both created in your brain. This works because it ignores the outside world, if only for a moment, and gets you to focus on things inside. Once you do that, and you're out of the state of suffering, you can begin to make changes in real life again.

Having said all that, There's probably been a moment in your life that you can remember something great. Like a time you did something nice for someone. Or a time you won something, or created something, or just rocked out so hard it knocked a brick out of the universe. So relax, you're awesome. You'll be just fine.

Nobody has never been loved by someone, somewhere in time. Even if it feels like in the moment nobody cares, and even if it's true, there may have been someone in the past that did. Or maybe even someone you've never met who thought you were amazing from afar. And *even* if that isn't true, there will be someone in the future that will. Whenever people go through something very hard, they almost always find people just like them afterward. And through that connection of survival, new love can grow out of the worst things. But remember, somewhere in time, the past, present, or future, someone loves you. Really, you'll be just fine.

In any case, just remember:

Emotions *always* feel like they are forever, and they *never* are.

All feelings are temporary.

And life is wise, so ask yourself why life has brought you to this moment and what are you supposed to learn from it.

That's it. That's all I got. I hope this helps. Cheers!

Gravity Is Dead - How Gravity is Just a Side-Effect of the Expansion of the Universe

2010-09-01T21:03:00.000-07:00

My Ideas on Gravity - by: Chiron Bramberger

Gravity is dead. There is no gravity. Since Newton we've been all wrong. Gravity is not a force. It doesn't exist. It's just an illusion; a fake; a side-effect; an emergent property of another process. We've been had.

The following is an informal discussion of my collection of ideas on gravity and how I think it works.

Before going into the ideas, it's important to outline certain observations about gravity and the universe.

Galileo, Newton, Einstein, Hawkings and others, have given us many pictures of gravity. Gravity describes that objects warp space-time such that they accelerate towards each other. More specifically, the following lists what we think and know about gravity:

- Objects accelerate towards each other

- Without an external frame of reference, a person in spaceship accelerating through space wouldn't know if they were in the presence of a gradational field, for example if the box were sitting on the surface of the Earth, or actually accelerating

- Time appears to go by at a different rate in a gravitational field than outside of it. For example, orbiting a black-hole in a spaceship would be like travelling into the future, thus time would appear to move more quickly if you were to observe something far away from the black-hole.

- Gravity works over great distances, seemly instantly or at least the speed of light, without being blocked by any confirmed known substance of method. For example, nobody has created a gravity shield that blocks the effects of gravity.

- Gravity has been hypothesized to work via waves or particles, yet neither gravity particles have been discovered, nor have gravity waves been directly measured, although they have been measured indirectly.

- Although there are various hypothesized methods for which gravity may work at the quantum level, there isn't definitive quantum model for gravity. In fact, gravity and quantum mechanics have a history of not getting along together.

- Light is bent by gravity.

- The universe is expanding.

- The speed limit of the universe is the speed of light.

- Time slows down when travelling at near the speed of light, similar to that in the presence of a gravitational field.

Going into detail on the above points is outside the scope of this discussion.

-----

The main idea in my vision of gravity is that gravity is simply an emergent side-effect of the expansion of the universe, and that there is no real gravity in this sense. I think that there may be something like waves in space-time caused by gravity, but that there is no real gravity that is made of waves or particles.

With the expansion of the universe, I think of the universe like a sheet of material, such as a piece of plastic wrap. As plastic wrap expands, it gets stretched. Like the skin on a drum.

I think that masses grip space-time such that prevent the expansion of the universe, or using the above analogy, the stretching of the universe is reduced when compared to the rest of the plastic. Like a piece of tape stuck to a piece of plastic wrap, the tape keeps the stretching from taking place evenly, and the unevenness creates areas where near the tape the tightness is reduced. However, unlike a piece of tape on plastic wrap, in space masses can move. I believe they move through the universe without releasing their grip on the space-time around them.

If there were a single object in an expanding universe like I describe, then there wouldn't be any gravity to readily observe. However, when there are two objects in an expanding universe, they each grip the space-time changing it's "tightness", such that there is a pocket of "looser" space-time between them. Since objects can move without releasing this grip on space-time, the objects experience a "tightness" or "pressure" of sorts all around them, effectively pushing them towards the pocket of "looser" space-time between them.

This idea of space-time having a density goes along with the Einstein view of gravity, but in this model the density or "tightness" is the result of the competing expansion of the universe verses the pockets of more slowly expanding universe between the masses.

Here are some pictures of plastic-wrap and circles of duct-tape to illustrate the effect describing a moment in a 3D universe, as projected onto the 2D universe of the plastic wrap. The silver grid acts as a reference to the "stretching" of the universe.

(pictures of before and after we expand our plastic wrap model of space-time and it's duct-tape masses)

This would explain how gravity works over large distances while being unaffected or blocked by anything. These pockets of "looser" space-time form between all objects, and their formation would instantly affect the "tightness" of both nearby space-time as well as the entire universe. Even distant object would create a sightly less "tight" pocket of space-time between them, and as the universe expand, the surrounding universe is "tighter", and the pocket is "looser", thus the objects are "pushed" by the differing "pressures" of space-time between them. The objects would have nowhere else to go but to be "pushed" by this "pressure" into the pocket. The pocket would then be smaller and the pocket would have more "looseness" than before since the space between the objects would be smaller, all while the universe expands more increasing the "pressure" and increasing the overall effect and hence the acceleration.

This would also explain why time seems to run differently in a gravitational field. An object near a massive object would be in a "loose" pocket and therefore as it travels it is moving through more dense space-time as compared to a tighter area of the universe where the expansion would be proceeding unabated. As you move through a "thicker" or "looser" area of space-time, you travel across a greater distance of space and time, therefore, compared to another observer, you seem to be moving through time as well as space, more than they are, and thus it appears they are travelling forward in time, compared to us.

If we look at the weird things that we observe with gravity, we can try to explain these observation with these ideas.

"- Objects accelerate towards each other"

As the universe expands, massive objects create pockets between them which act to shield the pocket from the expansion of the universe. But because the objects can move while keeping their grip on space-time, they are eventually "pushed" or "sucked" into the "looser" pocket of space-time by all the more "dense" or "bunched up" and "stretched" areas around it. This "bunched-up-space-time" "differential" creates these interactions that the object are both pushed and fall into each other.

"- Without an external frame of reference, a person in spaceship accelerating through space wouldn't know if they were in the presence of a gradational field, for example if the box were sitting on the surface of the Earth, or actually accelerating"

When we are standing in an elevator, we can't tell if it's acceleration through space, or sitting on the ground. Using these ideas, we can see that even sitting on the ground, we are accelerating. The universe is stretching, and pushing down and out from under our feet so-to-speak, the effect is the same as accelerating, only it's the energy of the acceleration of the universe and the differential in space-time "squeezing" down on us that creates the same conditions that looks and feel like acceleration.

"- Time appears to go by at a different rate in a gravitational field than outside of it. For example, orbiting a black-hole in a spaceship would be like travelling into the future, thus time would appear to move more quickly if you were to observe something far away from the black-hole."

As we travel though a region of space near a large body, like a sun or black-hole, we are traveling through more "dense" or "thick" or "bunched up" space-time and therefore appear to be moving through time more quickly.

"- Gravity works over great distances, seemly instantly or at least the speed of light, without being blocked by any confirmed known substance of method. For example, nobody has created a gravity shield that blocks the effects of gravity."

When objects move through space, they exert their influence of the "bunched-upness" of space-time, without releasing the "bunched-upness". The reason objects' gravity work quickly over large distances is because all the points between the two objects "stretch" or "release" their "tension" at the same time. The effect is not instant, which is why we can indirectly observe gravity wave-like effects, but the waves aren't actually carrying the force, like for example the way light waves are both waves and carry the force of the light energy within them.

"- Gravity has been hypothesized to work via waves or particles, yet neither gravity particles have been discovered, nor have gravity waves been directly measured, although they have been measured indirectly."

Gravity doesn't actually exist, therefore we'll never find gravity particles or waves like we do for light. Gravity, as we know it, is just a side-effect of the interaction of masses on warping space-time and the energy of the expansion of the universe.

" - Although there are various hypothesized methods for which gravity may work at the quantum level, there isn't definitive quantum model for gravity. In fact, gravity and quantum mechanics have a history of not getting along together. "

There isn't a quantum model of gravity that really feels right, because there is no gravity - it's just a side effect. The quantum model that would work would be a model that explains how masses effects space-time. I suspect that space-time, when compressed to be dense enough, actually becomes or converts into matter. Just like matter and energy are related and interchangeable, I think space-time and matter-energy are interchangeable. In this sense, masses moving through space-time are like icebergs moving through the ocean. They are both water, just in different forms. A quantum model of how matter, energy, space, and time actually convert between these forms would explain how the energy of the expansion of the universe, as imparted through the big bang, is converted into space-time, and how mass is converted into space-time, and how the conversion works, perhaps through the squeezing we think of as gravity. Once we understand that, we'll understand how this weird side-effect of gravity takes place.

"- Light is bent by gravity. "

As light travels through space-time, masses creates loose pockets, and as light travels through the pockets, it is bent because inside the pocket the same apparent distance is full of more space-time and therefore contains more time, so the light is moving through "denser" space-time and, just like light passing through glass into air or another liquid, the different "densities" cause part of the bean to slow down vs. the other part, and change the course of the beam of light. But also, light having it's own particles, creates and fall into the pockets of other masses, but like any other masses in the universe. Nothing really changes here other than how we think about gravity.

" - The universe is expanding. "

The big bang an explosion of energy. Whatever this stuff originally was, I think matter, space, energy, and time all comes from this base. As the universe expands, parts of the universe eventually turn into matter, and the matter start creating pockets and, as above, we have what looks like gravity. The engine of gravity drives everything else in the universe, through condensing into stars, which then create other elements, release other energies, etc. Therefore, gravity isn't the engine that creates everything in the universe, the expansion of the universe is the energy of the universe from the big bang, and that energy drives and is converted into matter and everything else. This looks like gravity, but it's just a process, not a force onto itself. The big bang creates everything, and gravity is just a description of a part of that process.

"- The speed limit of the universe is the speed of light. "

If the expanding universe drives what we think of as gravity, then the speed of light is probably related to the speed or the amount of energy needed to outrun the universe. But you can't outrun the universe, because you'd have to leave the universe and can't get outside of the universe. I think that speed of light is related to the speed of the expansion of the universe, such that nothing ever gets enough energy to outrun the universe itself, because that would require all the energy that exists inside the universe itself. So we can never leave the universe. It is the stuff, the power, and the container and the clock, all in one. The speed of light is the only way the universe can exist and be stable without any given process having the ability to use up all the energy in the expanding universe in trying to outrun the expansion.

-----

One implication of these ideas is that if the expansion of the universe were to stop, gravity would appear to change instantly throughout the universe. My gut feeling is that gravity would seem to disappear altogether, or more likely, gravity will change from being an acceleration to a simple velocity. The differences between masses would still create pockets, but without the expanding universe around it pouring energy into it, I think that objects would appear to fall at a constant rate instead of an exponential rate. This would probably complicate things for everyone, if all the stars in the universe don't all explode at the same time.

Finally, I believe that it will be possible to manipulate what we think of a gravity. I'm really not sure how it would work, but my guess and gut feeling is that space-time is probably like non-Newtonian fluids. If we can find a way to create a tiny pocket of expanding universe, even if only for a moment, inside a large loose pocket (inside what we think of today as a gravitational field) then I think if we switch on and off this tiny pocket of expanded universe, it will "appear" to other objects in the universe like a "tighter" area of the universe, without actually needing to constantly expand, and hopefully disrupt or even shield the effects of "gravity" nearby. The effect would probably not work over large distances and probably be a very local phenomenon. So my very big guess is that a very large and powerful oscillating electromagnetic field at the right energy levels and frequency should simulate a "tight" pocket of universe and create what we would think of as a gravity shield. These non-Newtonian fluid-looking standing wave patterns would "tighten up" an area in the pocket and appear to everything else like the rest of the "tight" expanding universe. This would have the effect of appearing to block the sliding of masses further into the "pocket" and look just like a "gravity shield" of some sort. I think that manipulating the universe to appear `just like the expansion of the universe is the key to manipulating gravity.

-----

It is important to note that I am not a professional physicist nor am I even remotely well practised in the mathematics required to engage in a certain level of discussion in this area. However, after my own research, it is clear that these ideas are new and possibly interesting enough to openly share. It is in the spirit of sharing that I write this.

If you are well versed formally in physics and mathematics, and are interested in working with me, I've love to hear from you. Maybe together we could actually try to put some real work into these ideas and create the foundations for a new working model of gravity… or at least have a lot of fun trying.

Get in touch. Leave comments below, visit my website www.chironbramberger.com or email me: chiron (at) bramberger (dot) com. Thanks!

Hacking Presentation Templates - A Larger Security Issue?

2010-02-25T01:04:00.001-08:00

In my last post, I talked about a tiny weird little vandalism in a Wikipedia template. Someone had added some text to a presentation template in Wikipedia that generates a multi-image format view of, well, two pictures.

After doing a Google search, it turns out to have affected at least 3 other pages. Wikipedia has several templates, so it looks like if there's a problem with a template, in this case an image presentation template, the vandalism gets repeated across pages. The benefit to the vandal would seem to be that it's easier to propagate a single graffiti across multiple pages, while making it harder for the average Wikipedian to quickly remove it, as the edit page wouldn't contain the text.

This makes me think of a bigger picture, which hadn't occurred to me before, that if you hack a single point in real life, or on the internet, then that point is all that is affected. You drive under a bridge, and you see "Jimmy loves Jane" or something sprayed in paint.

However, if you hack a piece of infrastructure, you have a much larger impact. In fact, not only do you impact the actual target, but conceal the hack within the layers of the infrastructure. An similar example would be if the mold that was used to build *all* bridges had the words "Jimmy loves Jane" carved into it, so that every bridge that is made had these words etched into the concrete.

Think about how every day we each interact with complex systems, which one made up of tiny little pieces. When you go to an ATM cash machine, there's communication with a central bank server, which figures out if the cash machine should give you any money or not. But when you actually *look* at the screen, it's most likely some template that drives the display that tells you your bank balance.

When you select the "Withdraw $20" button, you see a template that shows you what buttons do what. When you select "Account Balance" again, another template that takes data from the bank server and display's it to you.

So if someone hacked a cash machine, such that only the display templates were changes, then they could make the $40 withdraw button look like a $20. Then, you hack the machine spit out $20 less on each transaction. You also hack the template for the account balance. So as far as the person is concerned, they have their money, and their bank account is fine. And as far as the bank is concerned, everything is fine too, it's just $20 more than you think it is. So, if then you can hack a bank machine like this, you could go back at the end of the day and pick the $20 you skimmed off each transaction. When the bank refills the machine, they see exactly how much money they expected to see. This would go on until someone complained that they were missing $20.

This is a pretty bad example, because cash machine are very secure and I can't imagine anyone trying anything so dumb, but the point is simply that a change in a template, makes things *appear* differently than they are, and *hides* the change by burying it somewhere else in the code base. It would make it harder for programmers to find.

I guess, it's about security, infrastructure and perception. Presentation layers are everywhere now, because computers are fast and big enough to have many pieces. But in using and reusing code, in such a modular way, maybe there's a venerability that we haven't thought of yet.

In fact, that is exactly what happens when phishing attack happen over email. The actual website a bad one, made by the bad guys, but the facade is made to look real. This actually happened to me, I got an email, knew it was bad, but I checked it out of curiosity. The email sent me to a *real bank site* but, then opened up a tiny little real-looking popup to ask for my login and password. Of course I didn't fall for it, but on a bad day, if I wasn't paying attention, I could understand how easy it would be to fall for it.

Again, remember - always go directly to a website to login. Go to the address bar and type it in manually. It's easy to forget, especially when websites like eBay send you notices reminding you of auction endings soon. Don't even get me started on the eBay scammers out there. eBay is a great site - but follow safe practices. That's a whole other article. When it comes to sites that need a login, just type it into the address bar. Make it a habit. Don't even use bookmarks for online banking login pages. Type it into the address bar. Don't be lazy - be safe. I still have to remind myself sometimes.

Anyway, I hope this is someone helpful or useful in helping someone somewhere. Maybe just putting it out there will help developers think a few extra steps ahead when it comes to security, and think of so of the side effects or emergent properties of building safe infrastructure. The parts and the whole, right?

Weird Wikipedia Error

2010-02-24T20:00:00.000-08:00

UPDATE: This was fixed after I dropped an email to the great people at Wikipedia. It has to do with templates that affect multiple articles:

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Template:Double_image&diff=346188326&oldid=301398998

My next blog post will discuss this in the context of a bigger picture of security and modern technology life.

I just noticed this really weird Wikipedia error. There's this text in an article:

File:Malia Obama.jpg File:Sasha Obama.jpg

But the weird thing is, it's not Wikipedia graffiti. I looked at the WikiCode and compared it to the HTML of the page delivered... it's not in the WikiCode but it should be.

Weird.

More pics comparing the thing here:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/chironbramberger/sets/72157623379760703/

I Justed Launched the open-source PetSynth.org and I've already got picked up by 3 websites!

2009-10-16T21:58:00.000-07:00

In just these last few days I launched PetSynth.org, to share with the world the program I banged out, that turns your Commodore PET into a playable synth. It's open-source (GPL v2) and runs on a stock PET computer without any modifications.

The wonderful people at Retrothing.com picked it up, and said it's "surprisingly good considering the hardware limitations..." as well as "...I fear the potential audience for PetSynth is constrained by the number of functional Commodore PETs lurking in attics and basements. Of course, that just makes it cooler."

Also, the terrific people at MatrixSynth picked it up.

As well, the great people at Synthopia also picked it up, saying "It’s starting to look like old 8-bit computers are the new Roland TB-303."

I'm excited at all the wonderful attention, and I look forward to hearing from anyone who tries it out, or decided to actually dive into my messy punk-rock source code.

Woot!

The Original Tiny living room inside a PC

2009-10-15T17:36:00.000-07:00

I took some pictures back in 2006 that have been getting a lot of internet attention lately!

You can find the originals here on Flickr:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/chironbramberger/267402360/

They've been posted and re-posted to several sites, but apparently most of them don't know who originally took them.

Well, it was me, the original author and photographer, Chiron Bramberger! I took the living room inside a PC pictures that were posted to modding.ru, as well as the other PC case mod sites!

Maybe I should take some more :)

http://www.techpowerup.com/gallery/2338.html

http://www.engadget.com/2009/10/12/worlds-cutest-pint-sized-living-room-sets-up-shop-in-a-pc-case/

http://dvice.com/archives/2009/10/tiny-cozy-livin.php

http://forum.modding.ru/viewtopic.php?t=31539

(translated)

http://translate.google.com/translate?prev=hp&hl=en&js=y&u=http%3A%2F%2Fforum.modding.ru%2Fviewtopic.php%3Ft%3D31539&sl=ru&tl=en&history_state0=

http://freshome.com/2009/10/09/cute-tiny-living-room-inside-a-pc/comment-page-1/#comment-79030

http://technabob.com/blog/2009/10/02/tiny-living-room-pc-casemod/comment-page-1/#comment-29785

The Gizmodo.com article has had 57,000 or so views!!!

http://gizmodo.com/5373393/russian-casemod-freak-builds-a-miniature-living-room-inside-his-pc

http://nmy.tumblr.com/post/203167776/tiny-living-room-makes-its-way-inside-pc-casemod

Also, I'm not Russian! I'm Canadian! Oh those Russians!

Special thanks to Todor Delev who got the ball rolling at techpowerup.com and who's kept me updating on all the blogging and re-blogging! Thanks!

Megan Fox is totally cool

2009-10-04T16:48:00.001-07:00

Alright, so I'm watching some video on MSN where Megan Fox is speaking at her Jennifer's Body movie or something, anyway, apparently she was picked on in school and used to eat her lunch in the bathroom. Wow.

Any girl who goes from picked-on and eats lunch in the bathroom, and then goes on to become the hottest thing in Hollywood, is totally awesome. Love it. Rock on.

New Music Website

2009-10-02T17:48:00.000-07:00

I've been making music with old computers and video games for a while now, but I haven't put anything up. Well, today I start.

Broken Happiness Machines

http://www.brokenhappinessmachines.com/

I've got a short demo track up, but I'll be adding to it in the future.

This is the original project that Flytrap Gear grew out of.

Also, as an aside, the graphics were made in Google Sketchup. It's great and free!

networked printer FAIL!

2009-09-29T11:06:00.001-07:00

networked_printer_FAIL,
originally uploaded by chironbramberger.

HP makes great stuff. Honestly, I've been impressed lately. Also, HP makes new ink cartridges out of old ones. So right on for HP being actually green (and not just greenwashing).

However... my printer, which was great, was also hit with a power surge I think. There was a recent storm. Anywhoo.....

Take a look at the picture, and tell me what's wrong with it? It'll take a second or two. Think of it as an IQ test or sorts in problem identification, Personally, it took me far too long to realize it. :)

Walking-out on the web

2009-07-09T14:31:00.001-07:00

Walking-out on the web,
originally uploaded by chironbramberger.

You know those web pages where someone walks out and talks to you?

I totally did it. I was worried it wouldn't work, but I setup a little green screen movie studio set in my house, and did a bunch of work, and I did it.

I've got a quick little demo on my homepage now:

http://chironbramberger.com/

Hit refresh to see me run out again!

So yeah, it's a lot of manual work, and getting the lighting right is really hard, and it would need a boom mic done properly to get good sound, but with some elbow grease, and hard work, it lives!

Megan Fox

2009-07-03T13:23:00.001-07:00

Oh, now I know why I don't get the fuss over Megan Fox, she's CGI

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hXsd5aw8oas&feature=related

Seriously, she's not *that* hot. I don't get it. Every magazine cover, all of the internet, everything everywhere, it's all about her. If I were drunk she might make me marginally aroused at best... and that's a big maybe.

(Updated Oct 4 2009)

I have since totally turned around on Megan Fox.

http://chironbramberger.blogspot.com/2009/10/megan-fox-is-totally-cool.html

She now officially has some nerd cred.

The only other person that's on everything these days that perhaps is on *more* stuff than Megan Fox is Hanna Montana. Walmart, A&P, Pusateris - she's everywhere.

Okay, I lied about that last one. But I still don't get it. I'm fine with it.

How to Paint

2009-06-14T23:42:00.000-07:00

Here's a funny tutorial on how to make an oil painting.

I always loved watching that old guy on PBS who used to "fire it in"... but somehow this tutorial isn't quite as grandfatherly.

Also, you wouldn't believe how hard it was to find anything on the internet about that guy, William Alexander.

Not, William Alexander, the fugitive, nor William Alexander the painter from England circa 1767-1816, nor Bob Ross, the *other* guy who painted on PBS, who is also no longer with us.

I'm talking about this guy:

I haven't watched this guy in *forever*. Wow - that takes me back!!! He rules! That's punk rock - just oil paint wet-on-wet and in 30 minutes your done! Rock on Bill. :)

I love it

2009-05-27T18:32:00.000-07:00

Rashell is now calling her friends to let them know she's got a new blog post.

Oh wait... right now she's actually reading him the blog over the phone. This is truly amazing. I'm blown away by the awesomeness!

I love it.

Flytrap Gear

2009-04-08T02:12:00.000-07:00

Check out the guitar pedal I made!

Okay, I'm excited to share, but it's been almost a year since I first sacrificed an old computer upon the alter of the God's of Rock and created a guitar effects pedal. That's right, it's made almost completely from parts recycled from an old computer.

Not only does it work with guitars, but synthesizers, old computers and old video games. I've got a samples of some Commodore 64 being processed by it.

You can check it all out here:

www.FlytrapGear.com

It's also made from high-gloss plastic. The graphics are not screen printed either - they are hand transfered and then hand painted by me without any special tools. Since the graphics are on the inside, you can't scratch them off! If you do scratch it, you just need to buff and polish it up - good as new!

I've recently re-designed the electronics for better noise performance and durability. This means it's less susceptible to noise from nearby computers and wireless routers.

Like the first one, it also has a Sizzle switch which turns on the circuity to help noise gate some of the background noise in the signal. It also adds a light fuzzy effect and some nice overtones as well. This makes the old Commodore 64 sound like it's been glam'ed up with an edgy drive.

It also is designed to work with an internal rechargeable battery that's externally charged, like a laptop, without having to open it up. It also uses so little power that you'd need to charge it once every six months or more, depending on how much you use it.

Anyway, I'd love to hear what you think!

Cheers!

-Chi

Apple Mighty Mouse - 2 Second Fix!

2009-01-24T19:35:00.001-08:00

Apple Mighty Mouse - 2 second fix!,
originally uploaded by chironbramberger.

My Apple Might Mouse wasn't working properly; the scroll ball wasn't scrolling down anymore. It would scroll up, left and right, but not down. Both on a Mac and Windows machine.

I could have spent an hour or more taking it apart. I even found a guide here:

veoh.com - Taking apart an Apple Might Mouse

However, I've taken a part an Apple IIgs, PIsmo, PowerBook, and MacBook, and iPod mini, as well as various keyboard, and in both the best of worst sense of the term, Apple engineers to the edge.

I've fixed all the above, however, there are so many little tags, clips, slots, special shallow screws, and other things in hard to reach places. It's all too easy to scratch or bend things during the process. It's impressive, but neither fast nor fun much of the time.

After watching the guide above, which does do a decent job by-the-way, I had an idea. What about my new favorite cleaner?

Deoxit FaderLube!

I tired dripping a tiny little bit right onto the ball, wiped it several times with a cloth to get out any extra fluid...

..and it works as good as new!!!

It took longer to blog about this than to fix it!

Rocking the PICAXE!

2009-01-23T15:29:00.001-08:00

PICAXE!,
originally uploaded by chironbramberger.

I recently received a bunch of little PICAXE chips to work with, and after downloading the software, building an easy cable and an easy circuit, I'm off and away!

I was surprised at how well everything seems put together. The chips are even internally coupled so you don't have to worry about the dreaded ESD getting you! They also have a visual flow-chart programming mode with is also really great in educational environments.

http://www.rev-ed.co.uk/picaxe/

CPU Cores - Removing without Fire

2008-12-31T14:22:00.001-08:00

Blue CPU Core with Droplet - Wallpaper 1440x900,
originally uploaded by chironbramberger.

This picture is of a Pentium Classic CPU core I removed from it's ceramic packaging.

Here's how I did it. I put the CPU in a vice very carefully and used a fresh, sharp razor blade and hammered it to cleave off all the pins. This looks nice, but it messy to clean up. However, it's needed for the next step.

I then took the razor blade and hammered it between the gold plate covering the bottom of the CPU and the ceramic it's glued it. If you're very careful, you can do this without harming the CPU core inside.

Once that's off you've got a nicely exposed core. However, it's still attached to the ceramic behind the CPU.

I wish I could tell you how it did it, but I can't. It just popped off one day. Since the ceramic was cracked and smashed behind it, there was a tiny bit of core exposed. I guess that was all that was needed. Perhaps I'll get a boatload more someday and try to see how to pop out the core without cracking or annihilating it.

For now, just having a collection of 386, 486, and 586 core's exposed is great!

Also, the Flickr to Google blogger tool works well, as I used it to make this post. But you probably knew that.

DeoxIT FaderLube - Really Works!

2008-12-31T13:36:00.000-08:00

For years I've been fixing and trying to fix lots of everything. I'm that guy that people bring their broken stuff to.

However, there's one thing I never could get quite right. Volume controls, and other pot (potentiometer) based controls. I'd manage to get the crackle out, but if always came back within a short while. I'd even take the entire pot apart, clean each piece manually, and put it all back together. But even then, it was never quite right.

I tried WW-40 but that's stinky and yucky and generally not the best idea. I'd try 99% Isopropyl alcohol and that would work for a while, but generally not long. I even went to Radio Shack and got their "Tuner Cleaner" or whatever it's called (they also have a "Contact Cleaner") but that never seemed to do the trick either. In fact, it left a greezy film on the board, which was almost unavoidable since the spray can would go off like a rocket and hose down just about everything in the immediate area of the room (walls, floors, your face, whatever).

I even tried a few electronics cleaners from Canadian Tire, but without any better results. Everything barely worked.

For a while, before playing a game of Super Breakout on the Atari VCS, I'd take the big knob off and drop a few dips of alcohol into it, which would last only as long as the game. Plus, since my cleaning process removed the original lubrication of the pot, it would turn as smoothly. You can see the effect of all this while playing the game, the player paddle at the bottom of the screen would wiggle and wobble and generally react jerky and poorly during gameplay.

I've been reading a lot of online forums and blogs and whatnot, when I finally started reading about the DeoxIT line of products. They seemed great, and I finally managed to get my hands on some.

It's truly and wonderfully great. It's exactly right. It cleans and lubricates and lasts. You can see the difference in the video game controllers onscreen, and you can hear the difference in the volume controls. It's amazing. When compared to all the other crap I used, it simply kicks everything else in the butt. It's as great as everyone on the internet says it is. It lives up to the hype. I wish I had this stuff years ago. I want to treat everything in the house I have with it. It's really that great.

Here's a picture of the stuff I've used it on so far with great results.

I fixed a flaky Atari joystick, Atari paddles, and guitar plugs, pots and switches so far.

Plus, the spray nozzle at the top has a selector for how hard you want the spray to come out.

This is a great feature, since I figure I waste about %50 of and entire bottle of the old junk I used just because it hosed down everything in sight with one burst.

If you really want to make it last without wasting it, you can try what I like. I get an old bottle of eye drops, nasal spray (remove the hose inside to keep it from spraying up), or whatever small bottle that will let you drip it out, clean it and carefully fill it from the spray can. Now you can use a few drops when you need to, and wash out a pot in a hard to reach spot with the can if needed, and minimize waste. What's good for the environment is usually good for your wallet.

I wasn't paid to promote this. I believe it's a great product and it helps restore and repair electronics so you can lengthen their life and stretch your dollar.

Having said that, it's not cheap. You can order a diluted solution F5 can like mine from their website.

DeoxIT FaderLube at Caig.com

They also have 100% pure stuff in a tiny tube and squeeze bottle. It's actual pure lubricant and drips out thick and slow like honey.

It's great. Gets the crackle out. Honestly wonderful stuff.

iPod Mini Repearing - Soldering an SMD connector on a ribbon cable

2008-12-30T20:27:00.001-08:00

I recently tried fixing an iPod Mini. It's not entirely simple. The hard part is getting the unit apart. There's two main pieces that go in when the manufacture the device. The first is the main board with battery and screen. The second is the thumb wheel keypad. They must first slide that in, then the main board, then finally connect the two.

The problem is, the connector is a very tiny surface mount device on a ribbon connector, so when you try to unplug it, since you can't get a screwdriver in there, you end up ripping the flat ribbon wire away from connector while it's still plugged in.

I've dealt with this kind of thing before, and since it happened again I came up with another way of fixing it which I'd thought I'd share for anyone who might be interested.

In the first picture you see the leg of the connector separated from the ribbon wire.

The second leg ended up getting pulled off the plastic ribbon as well, but the trace was still connected to the leg so it's fine. I used a little super glue (crazy glue) to try and keep things together a bit better. I was afraid I might end up insulating the wire but that didn't end up being an issue.

I tired some rear window defroster paint to connect the leg to the trace, but it didn't have any grip on anything so it wasn't an option.

Here's what I did. Since I haven't yet Dremeled a fine point on my soldering iron tip for SMD work, I didn't want to use the soldering iron. Based on past experience, I've noticed that it's too easy to overheat the ribbon connector and melting the whole thing.

Step 1 - I used a pair of pliers to hold the part down. I didn't want to use my vice as it would probably scratch or break the part.

Step 2 - I wrapped copper wire around some tweezers and make coil in the middle of the wire coming off of the end of the tweezers.

Step 3 - I then cut a tiny piece of solder and placed it carefully beside the leg of the connector.

Here's a picture of solder piece.

Step 4 - I used a butane mini-soldering torch to heat the copper wire coil until it and the end of the wire was red hot.

Step 5 - I placed the tip of the hot wire against the piece of solder and leg until it melted and fused with the leg and ribbon trace.

Step 6 - Pulled away as soon as the solder was flowing.

Here's a picture of the setup, complete with glowing hot copper wire.

And here's a picture of the result.

Now, why would someone want to do this instead of another solution? Well, I noticed that the copper wire at the tip cools down very quickly, so it's harder to over heat the ribbon. Since the tip isn't a fine point narrowing from a larger shaft, there also probably isn't a large amount of heat coming off the rest of a soldering iron.

I also believe that, while heated the copper wire gets **much** hotter than the soldering iron. So, you've got the ability to heat a tiny part up to a very high temperature, in a very tiny area, with the ability to pull away and let it cool down fairly quickly as well, which gets the solder flowing, but then lets you stop things before they get too hot.

Here's the final part, repaired and plugged into the iPod Mini.

So, if you rip this sucker apart, maybe this might help. Although you just can't beat a temperature controlled and finely tipped soldering iron for SMD work.

:)

Comparing Mac2Sell with a real life eBay auction

2008-06-30T11:18:00.001-07:00

I recently came across a site that apparently tells you how much your used Apple Mac computer is worth:

http://www.mac2sell.net/

However, rather than taking it at face value, I instead did an http://www.ebay.ca search and found a recently ending Mac laptop for sale in Canada.

Here are the details of the auction:

MacBook Pro 1.83GHz 15" screen 2GB RAM 80GB HDD Intel Core Duo MA463LL/A
Item Location: Calgary, Alberta, Canada
26 bids
Winning bid: $1,147.56 CAD
Shipping to Canada: $35.64 CAD
Total: $1,183.20 CAD

Here are the results of a www.mac2sell.net search:
MacBook Pro 15 inch Intel Core Duo 1.83 GHz 2048 / 80 GB / superdrive
The Mac2Sell Quoted Value is
Total: $1,190.00 CAD

Difference: 99.43%

Although taking only one sample isn't exactly science, after doing a few other searches I found that the site is good at giving back numbers I'd be expecting. It seems pretty much bang on to me.

So the next time you want to pickup a Mac computer on ebay, instead of getting caught up in a bidding war and maybe paying too much, you could simply do a Mac2Sell search and set that as your maximum bid and see what happens. Worst case, you know you haven't overpaid in the heat of bidding.

Or if it's http://www.craigslist.org you're searching, now you've got a great reference tool for both buying and selling.

Cool.

Time Machine ready to roll

2008-06-03T02:28:00.000-07:00

After watching this YouTube video,

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oRWwI61so5Q&NR=1

I have proceeded to build my own time machine, and I have switched it one and already have my emails from the future.

It turns out that, in the future, gas prices are still high, and people are still douchbags.

http://www.cbc.ca/consumer/story/2008/05/27/ot-gas-080527.html

Also, no space cards yet.

http://www.glumbert.com/media/spacecar

Damn.

Instead of Zits

2008-05-27T23:10:00.000-07:00

Instead of searching YouTube for 'zit' and watching the super barfy gross-out home-cyst removal here:

(warning - really gross but probably safe for work)
http://youtube.com/watch?v=tkf2Jdo2IWE

I wished I had watched Asimo conduct the symphony:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cf5szwz6Qzc

Which got me thinking. Remember in Fight Club when Tyler and the Narrator were trying to think of who they would like to fight? Well, I'd like to see someone fight Asimo - barefisted.

I mean, it would be easy to win, but Asimo would still make you work for it.

Illegal Cabbie in Toronto XXY Pearson

2008-05-23T21:44:00.000-07:00

I arrived at the airport, got my bags, and was looking for a cab when this guy goes "Hey, are you looking for a cab?" I turn around, say yes and go with him.

Oddity #1 - He's on foot, not in an actual cab like all the other cabbies.

I walk back into the airport and down some escalators. We're now on the lower level and we start walking back out. I figure 'okay, this guy has parked his cab in departures or something.

Then we walk out and he tells me to wait there while he gets his car.

Oddity #2 - His cab is parked out in the general parking area of the airport, not on the side ready to pick someone up.

He pulls up in his cab when I realize it's just a car. There's no sign on the top of the cab and no Toronto cab official license plate.

Oddity #3 - There's no **real** cab, just some guy and his car.

I ask him about this and he says that he's with a special airport service that runs off a flat rate. Okay.

He puts my luggage in the trunk and I ask for a business card. Alright.

Oddity #4 - He prints his own super shitty business cards on perforated do-it-yourself paper.

I get into the back of the cab and asked him why he doesn't have a meter. He says it's because his company is based on a flat rate. Again.

Oddity #5 - No meter.

I bail. I ask him to pull over, get out, and jump into another real cab. The driver in the new cab, complete with real license and license plate, tells me about how those illegal cabbies will sometimes drive away with your luggage or force you to pay more then they said they would charge. Or worse. Who knows, right? Once you're in a random strangers car, they have the upper hand.

Maybe it would have been fine. Maybe not. I went with my gut and I'm glad I did.

What Open Source software doesn't have to do.

2008-04-27T21:41:00.003-07:00

I've talked to a lot of people about open source software, as well as read a lot about what people think about open source software, and there's a trend that I've noticed. It's something that I wouldn't have noticed without open source even existing, as a way of illuminating a whole perception in our society.

There's this expectation that open source software should do, or be, this or that, and that the people who make open source software should be meeting all these needs of users. For example, that Linux should support all hardware flawlessly or run Windows apps like Photoshop.

The funny thing is, with a company, their product should do the things customers want, if only because they want more customer and more profit. But open source software simply exists. It's doesn't have to be, or do, anything. But people aren't used to feeling that way about something they see as a product, when it is in fact doesn't have to be a product at all.

Usually, when talking about software and Linux and open source, the discussion moves from how it all works and how great Linux is, to what it doesn't do.

People tend to rely on specific applications that become the cornerstone of their whole work. A good example is Microsoft Outlook.

People run their whole business lives out of that program. Many people rely on it to keep their whole day on track. In a client focused job, this is very critical, because you need to make sure that you don't give the client the wrong impression. Quite simply, you can't ever let them feel like you're too busy for them. You just can't flake out, or come across as flaking out even if you aren't.

This is different from a production oriented job, because your whole job is to produce or make something. In the world of client services, the client knows that you're whole job is deal with them. The feeling might be something like "How are you too busy to give me a call-back?" Sure, maybe someone has more then one client to deal with, but in that case, and if the client is allowed to stew in their own flaked-out-on-black-hole, they might be thinking "Hey, my company give your company $1 million dollars a year in business. Surely you can afford $40,000 on someone who's whole job is to read my emails and call me back."

The truth is, the client may or may not be the only one, but it doesn't matter. What's matters is that they don't end up feeling that way. That's why Outlook sells.

Oh, and something like muscle memory.

As a personal information manager, Outlook is pretty good. It works reliably and relatively consistently. It doesn't everything you need it to do, has a pretty big after-market selection of third party plugins, and supports Microsoft Exchange, which is how businesses let everyone share everything. If you want to book a meeting, instead of asking a bunch of people, Outlook shows you who's free, and makes it easy enough.

As far as muscle memory is concerned, people get really good and fast at a piece of software they use all day, every single day, for years on end. Especially when it's for work. In a personal setting, if there's something you don't know how to do, and you don't really need to do it, you may never end up learning it the first time. However, when it's for a job, everything you learn you pretty much have to learn, so you get really good at it. That's part of the point of jobs. But that's another story.

WIth muscle memory, whatever part of brains control movement start to take over some of the work that our conscience mind used to do. Anyone who plays golf might understand this. The first few times you play, you have to think intently on what your arms and legs and wrist are doing when you swing. But after a several games, you stop having to think about those things - you just do them. Riding a bike, driving, playing a musical instrument, are all like this. You train yourself to be good and fast and you stop having to think about it and can focus on the big picture.

So when someone comes along and talk about how great open source is, and how it's a good thing, and how great Linux is, and how it's free so it's great for business because they don't have to pay and you can get all kinds of great stuff for it, people are excited. People have a general sense of how powerful a software company is, perhaps even more so then the average programmer-type, if only because they don't know how to create software on their own.

However, when they ask about Outlook, Photoshop, Microsoft Word, or ProTools, the answer starts with "well, there's several other ways to do the same thing..." and you've lost them.

It's not that the alternative are bad. Evolution is great, and mets many of the same needs as Outlook. The GIMP is a also a wonderful program, with a lot of features not present in Photoshop.

But when someone is fast, and I mean really really **really** fast at being production in one application they use all day, every day, all day long, asking them to switch to another application is a big deal. Not because learning is hard, or because they can't do it, or they don't get it, but because they simply would loose days, weeks, perhaps months of high-speed productivity while re-training their application muscle memory.

I've come to notice that the amount of time it takes to create something for a client is almost unimportant when compared to the quickness of your ability to make changes. I think this has to do with expectations. When I client is told how long it'll take to create something for them, it might not be the number they want, or ask for, but people are reasonable, and if the timeline is reasonable then you can usually work things out.

But when a client gets the first work, they have an expectation. It might be something that can't describe, they simply have it and nobody knows what it is until you give them something. But once they have it, they expect that anything that's "wrong" shouldn't be the way it is. The expectation is that changes will only take a few days or weeks, and without a working context of how the project is put together, all they can guess it is that there's some configuration box somewhere that lets you click a few check boxes and split out a new program, or design or whatever.

If the project was well put together well, then the changes are often easy. However, if the project was rushed together, then it's probably not very organized, or perhaps has a few statically created elements that would need to be re-created from scratch in order to make the client's changes.

So when you ask someone to give up a program like Photoshop, it's not just about being slow. It's not just about learning something new. It's about the client contact, who didn't think there would changes from her boss, that didn't put in any extra buffer time, who needs the changes by midnight, so she can stay up all night putting the package together for her boss. It's about her. It's about not taking an extra hour because you just can't figure out where they put the dialog box that controls some part of the program.

That's why people stick to what they know. When they can't, they take a course, and get moved to another area while they work with someone else while they play catchup, and learn all the little tips and tricks that make someone fast. The little stuff you can't just Google answers for.

That's why. That's why these open source discussions loose people.

That's also why customers go back to Adobe or Microsoft or whomever and talk about what their product **should** do. What little things that, no matter how fast they get just end up causing grief. They go back because they are the customer, and they have their own clients, and they are more then happy to spend some of the money they make off of their clients, or job or whatever, on Microsoft or Adobe of Apple, to have the product help their day feel less stressful. To help them look good. To help those companies keep them as customers. The customer has invested their own brian in their company's product. Learning literally reshapes the brain, as old connections are pruned and new ones are grown.

Companies should respect this, because we've only got one brain, and it's very much a good part of the seat of our soul.

Even cost-free software has this same expectation. People are asking themselves 'if I invest my learning in your product, what are you going to do for me?' People invest their learning, but they also often share that learning with their friends, coworkers, and families. Even if only in the form of a recommendation, this is an important asset to a company, and perhaps one of the most powerful marketing tools. The recommendation of a trusted individual.

Open source software, on the other hand, has none of these concerns.

Although their might be businesses built on open source software, and those businesses might have these concerns, the software itself, and more importantly the open source community that built it, just doesn't need to do anything for anyone.

Open source software is built usually by either big companies who have made it part of their overall business strategy, or by individual human beings who have a personal itch to scratch. They simply put the software out into the wild for anyone to do whatever they want with it.

Open source advocates sound like a company, selling the ideals and benefits of open source, but usually are met with responses like "well, Linux is great, but they should really make it so you can run Photoshop without having to do any extra work". Although this would be true of someone trying to get to you do something, like support a for-profit company; With open source, there simply isn't anyone who should do anything.

Why should a programmer who's created an automatic computer controlled open source cat feeder makes changes to the software for you?

Linux, whatever distribution flavor, shouldn't have to do anything. It shouldn't have to even work. Nobody has paid for it. Nobody is in charge. Everyone is free to do a whole lot of work getting it to do the specific thing they want it to do. Linux doesn't need to run Photoshop. It's not important to Linux. It's not important to open source. It might be important to some people, and it might even be important enough that they want to work hard at making that happen, instead of engaging in a behavior some might think of as learned helplessness.

Therein lies a major attitude difference between actually open source community member, and the average computer user. The average non-programmer computer user doesn't want to program, and why should they? And the average open source programmer doesn't want to make their program all things to all people, and why should they either?

Freedom is a tricky thing. Helping people is a tricky thing. Is helping people to be free a good thing, or a patronizing thing? Is helping people for money a good thing? Is helping people for free a good thing?

Open source has bestowed upon it's software something I like to call "Freedom from profit". And with that comes to ability to be free of the needs of the customer. Although some people feel very strongly that Microsoft Windows and it's business strategies with OEMs to have left people without a lot of freedom regardless.

But it doesn't matter because open source will eventually take over the world. It's just going to take a longer time then just replacing most of the functionality of the averaged-out desktop experience. But that's another story.

Apple Ideas

2008-04-27T03:14:00.000-07:00

Alright, I have to write about this, if only for my own personal time-stamp. It's probably in no way worth reading.

A few years I started thinking "Why doesn't Macromedia and Adobe merge?" It seemed pretty obvious to me. Then a few years later it happened. At the time, I was also thinking that they could buy a Linux company and produce a bootable Live-CD with trials / serial activated version of their software suite. Well, that last part never happened.

Then, when the SCO case came out, I was thinking "Hey, this is totally crap. It's not going to work out for them. Too bad I can't short their stock". It was all new then, but turns out that's how it turned out. Nothing exciting there, most slashdot nerd were thinking the same thing.

I was also wishing I could buy Google stock way back when it was growing but everyone thought it was going to stop and have some kind of correction. That one would have worked out too. But alas, I'm not an investor.

Anyway, I've been reading and watching and listening to a lot of personal computer history lately, and in particular I've been reading about Commodore in On The Edge. As I'm reading this, I'm thinking "Hey, how come Apple doesn't make even more stuff in house?"

Think about it. Back in the day, making a computer was really making a computer. It lots of ROM code and chips and video circuitry and disk controllers and figuring out where things go and how they should work. Today it's basically a CPU, almost always an x86, and a chipset and you're ready to roll.

I was thinking, like Commodore bought MOS Technologies in search of vertical integration, why doesn't Apple buy some chip company?

I just about lost my mind just now when I happened to catch that Apple has done exactly that.

So, from now on, I'm going to post all my crazy little ideas of what I think could, or might, or even should happen, just so I can say, if only to myself, "See, I saw that one coming."

Also, just for the record, and I have little hope, proof, or even supporting ideas, but I think Apple could get into the car market, as in building embedded systems for cars. Don't ask me why. I have no clue. I just see Apple in cars. The way Microsoft thought it would but never did.

Living Frugal Isn't very Rock and Roll

2008-04-23T05:12:00.000-07:00

Being rich isn't cool. Spending money like you don't care is cool.

What's cool about being cheap? There's no payoff for bystanders. When someone is totally rich, drives a beat-up old car, shops at thrift stores, buys and sells things used on action sites and classified, and generally doesn't go out throwing lavish parties or having opulent dinners, then anyone else who's standing on the bylines isn't getting one very cool payoff. If they themselves aren't wealthy, it's always at least a little fun to watch and live vicariously through someone else's over-top-escapades.

The interesting effect of this is that there's a social reward feedback loop that takes place when someone within a social groups starts earning what they perceive to be as a lot of money. You get to be a little famous for being Mr. Moneybags.

The payoff is even higher if you do silly and outrageously unnecessary things. This is the essence of 'bling'.

So if someone is in a peer group of people who don't come from a history of money, and that person then makes a lot of money, they are highly likely to take a few splurges here and there, which get the attention of others, creates some social validation, and re-enforces the entire cycle until the wealthy person is wealthy no longer.

You can see this statistic that the average lottery winner goes back to having a job and roughly similar lives to their previous ones. All in about 2 years. [ref 1 needed]

Anyone who's ever got a big raise at work knows that, when you do the taxes and deductions, it never ends up feeling like a who lot when you get your next paycheck. But it's not that numbers that ends up driving the purchases. It's the perception of wealth of whatever their current salary and position are dictating that drives this. It's probably different for everyone.

But the net effect is the same. Saving money just isn't cool. It definitely isn't Rock Star livin'. Just ask Willy Nelson.

http://moneycentral.msn.com/content/SavingandDebt/P75072.asp

LCD vs. CRT vs. Trees vs. Michael Bay?

2008-04-19T00:35:00.000-07:00

Anyone browsing craigslist recently would have probably noticed something in the technology section. There are tons and tons of free CRT monitors unable to find a home.

I don't know what the environmental harm this mass exodus of the mighty CRTs from our businesses and homes will be, but it'll probably be bad. In fact, one could figure out the 'environmental-return-on-investment' or EROI, by calculating some index of environmental harm, and comparing it to the environmental benefits of the power saving of LCD's.

It's funny to think that something that solves one problem, power-hungry CRTs burning up energy, creates another, CRT landfill, and that at some point in the future enough time will have passed such that the second problem will be exhausted (the damage from CRTs) while the benefits of the first will have aggregated over time. I for one do **not** volunteer.

However, what we can do is measure the power differences! Is it science? Who cares, it's fun! So I whipped out my Kill-o-Watt and did some measurements.

It turns out that, the way you use **both** changes the power usage. Here's the raw data:

- CRT Monitor -
All White Screen: 90 watts
All Black Screen: 71 watts
Average: 80.5 watts

- LCD Monitor -
All White Screen: 28 watts
All Black Screen: 29 watts
Average: 28.5 watts

- Some interesting numbers -
The CRT uses 27% more power displaying an all white vs. all black screen
The LCD uses 4% less power displaying an all white vs. all black screen
The LCD uses 35% less power, on average, overall of a CRT

It turns out that, as no surprise, a CRT monitor displaying nothing but black uses less power then when the screen is all white. This is because the gun firing at the screen is doing mostly nothing when drawing black. When the screen is white, the gun is firing all the time, in order to light up the whole screen, and so you get 20 more watts of power drain.

This is pretty interesting, since we usually don't think about **how** we use something as affecting the environment, especially when it comes to technology. If you have a CRT monitor, and a really bright and mostly white screensaver and desktop wallpaper, you're using up as much power and money, and doing as much damage as possible.

However, I didn't think that LCDs would register a noticeable difference, never mind the opposite effect! But it makes sense. With an LCD screen, the bulb inside is running all the time, regardless of what we are doing. However, the screen itself acts like a series of small, electronic sunglasses, turning on completely to block out all the light and create a black pixel, and turning off completely letting the light through and creating a white pixel.

It may only be 1 watt of difference, but it's interesting just the same. That means, if your screensaver, desktop wallpaper, and daily activities are black or mostly dark, then your maximizing the power, money and adverse environmental effects of your monitor.

But clearly, the LCDs use so much less power, you're still better off going LCD, for your power, money and environmental karma.

But here's what I really want to know:

What did Google's all white homepage cost the environment in carbon emissions back when CRTs were the common monitor?

What does Windows XP's default mostly black screensaver cost the environment in carbon emissions now that LCDs are the common monitor?

How many trees cry every time a Michael Bay movie explosion whites out a screen on a home theater system?

Old Computers

2008-04-18T01:17:00.001-07:00

First of all, I love computers. New and old. Technology is great. Sign me up and plug me in!

I was talking to my brother recently about old computers and what it is I like about them.

There are a lot of things about old computers that are great. Just tonight I realized that you could actually have a fairly complete understanding of a 1980's personal computer from top to bottom. From the logic gates, to the CPU, whether it's a Z80, MOS 6802, or Intel 8086, through to the operating system, and right up into the program. Head to toes.

Today when you take a computer science course, you learn little pieces here and there, a logic gate, or the ideas of a low level programming language, often in the form of a emulated CPU, or maybe a fictional CPU designed for learning. Maybe you even build a binary adder. But then it's back to learning something useful Java or C# or something.

Maybe I'm wrong, it's not like I'm in university right now, however, it seems like learning some of these basic things by making a logic gate or adder or something, feel like growing a single blade of grass as starting point of learning football. So far and away.

It seems like making computers do things is mostly a case of taking an x86 based CPU, some fully realized OS, a byte code based virtual machine, a whole wack of libraries and API's, a editor and IDE environment with a full knowledge of the API's, and boom - you finally start making something.

This makes sense as it evolved out of needs to encapsulate layers of very annoying details away so that it's easier to create and maintain your project. Or perhaps your piece of the project.

I think this is all great, really I do. Ruby on Rails is really quite awesome!

It all seems like so much. So many layers, and pieces, all of which are moving targets, and all of which need constant refreshing. It seems like we went from swimming in different, but well known ponds - Apple, Commodore, IBM, DOS, CP/M - to one great big ocean. It's just overwhelming to understand, and sometimes underwhelming to explore. Things got more complex and more homogeneous.

Using computers today seems so much like watching TV. The web pages turned into databases which turned into web apps which turned into social web apps which turned into 1-click perpetual payoff. Meanwhile, desktop apps are more like web pages.

But I think the experience of using computers today has lost something else.

You see, the GUI interface changes the very idea of what using a computer should be.

Let's take a side trip. Imagine your living millions of year ago in a thriving village, and things are so well, that there's lots of food and no worry of war or scary animals. No imagine your belly is full and looking out into the wilderness. What would you be thinking?

Now imagine your living in a modern city today, and you sitting at a restaurant, after eating, and looking at a desert menu. What you are thinking now?

When the GUI first come out on the scene, it offered a very friendly way of using a computer. Instead of having to know a bunch of stuff, you are presented with a list. All the functions and programs of the computer are laid out in a nice little menu, complete with pictures.

What this is saying to the user is "We've figured everything out for you, and here's all the things you can do. Wouldn't you like to pick something to do? We've made a nice menu for you to choose from."

With the advent of the modern internet, that desert menu is pretty damn big. So big, in fact, that you can spend an almost indefinite period of time getting entertained by it.

But way back in the early days of the personal computer, this is what it was like.

You got a prompt. A flashing green cursor.

You don't get to pick from a list of things to do. You can do anything you want. You can do anything.

There's no list. There's no waitress walking you pleasantly through glossy catalog of choices.

You're faced with your own two hands and ability to explore and create. That flashing green cursor is sitting there waiting for you to go, or do, or be anything you want it, or yourself to be.

It's a canvas, not a catalog.

I realize that most people know what they want, and they like it when someone else has figured it all out for them. What I wonder about is the kids.

They get blasted into the ocean full of high speed internet whiz bang, instead of sitting on the shore, wondering what's out there, and maybe making their own raft.

Writing

2008-04-18T01:16:00.000-07:00

I'm going to start writing now.