Oh man, do I have a treat for you guys today.

I know I know, most of the stuff I give you I didn't make, and I just found somewhere, but hey, for now think of me as a place to visit and find fun and interesting new things. Eventually I will probably start making some stuff of my own and throwing you links to that too. probably start with flash, but right now I have enough stuff in my life to work out so I am giving you this instead.

first is a fun little page that will tell you a bit about what you are listening to
it is called LivePlasma

it is a nifty little site where you type in an artist and it gives you graphical representation of that band and the bands that are similar and have certain relationships. A theusaurus for music, most excellent.

The next is something I am currently enjoying a LOT. It is called Pandora Dynamic Internet Radio, or Pandora for short. While perhaps not living up to its namesake, it is certainly a lot of fun. It is similar to live plasma, except it creates a radio station based on the artist you input. It adds songs of similar artists to the play list, and you can rate them as closer or farther from what you were looking for.

you can find that here: PANDORA!

And here is my first, and so far favorite, radio station creation on Pandora, in case you were interested.

Hungry Lucy Station

I have discovered I am not capable of being witty all the time.

This has been a most disappointing discovery, but one I am going to try to cope with.

I know I haven't been updating very often, but I guess I just don't feel passionately on a lot of issues.

I have begun to see why people believe indifference to be the greatest of evils, for indifference seems to be what allows evil to exist. That may just be me being optimistic though.

Even so, I take privacy very seriously, I know the government watches me, northeastern monitors me, and google probably shuffles through everythign of mine on their servers, but at least I try to make it harder, and stick with people that are less likely to go through my things.

of late I have been in deep thought over one of the few things I am truly passionate about. for the longest time I believed I would lay down my life for a friend (friend used in this sense as someone I really care about deeply, not just a co-worker I get along with etc.). I still believe this is true, but I am beginning to wonder if I need to be a more seperate entity.

all in all I am not sure what is worth being passionate about, I am even skeptical of the saying "it doesn't matter what you are passionate about as long as you are passionate about something". I am beginning to wonder why, and why not. It is hard wondering about BOTH sides of an argument.

oh well, more thoughts to come.

Because sometimes we all need a pick-me-up.

One of my readers sent me an interesting article I think might be worth checking out (I have read it, it is a bit long winded and this guy comes of a bit academia heavy (bodies are simply transportation for our heads, kind of thing) but it is good and has some good points). Just got me thinking that Reading is really important to my life, and I really do need a place to go. I mean I read here in the room, but I am talking on IM, updating my blog (yes yes I know), websurfing, writing, snacking, and ben is playing his music, and we occasionally talk about some point or another, and distractions abound. so it isn't really the same.

one thing I have found though is that I will always love reading in the bathroom. First, they have them just about everywhere, second they often give you somewhere reasonably quiet and secluded to read, third they take care of at least one basic need so the amount of interruptions are cut down :-P.

But really folks, I Love reading (capital for a reason) and will never give it up. It comforts me, calms me down, and helps me think. It cheers me up and makes me feel alive and entertains me. Terry Pratchett (hey I quoted him earlier) wrote a book (series really) where the Dwarves consider all written text holy. They believe that by writing something you bring it into being. An interesting concept but I have to say I kind of feel words have some power. Not any particular words, but words in general.

anyway, enough of me blathering on, here is the article

Article

Look it's Choo-choo bear. Click the pic for laughs and adorable pictures.





Many thanks to nodwick for being so damned funny.

jive machine

This is not for the faint of heart, but you know what? I wish I had the balls to do this.

Sometimes I think we get caught up on trying as hard as possible not to look like morons. I don't know, I think there is something almost endearing in being klumsy, bumbling, goofy, or just plain making an ass of yoruself sometimes. too much is bad true, but the stigma is so great against it I think we ought remind ourselves from time to time that running through the streets in your underwear, hiding in a plant display with fake plant peices held in front of your face, or sitting 20 feet up in a tree throwing candy to passers by can be a lot of fun, therapeutic, and an oddly effective way to break the ice.

It could not be happening because this sort of thing did not happen. Any contradictory evidence could be safely ignored.

Terry Pratchett, Jingo

Ever wonder how often you think that way? or some similar way? Anything outside of the immediate seems to be so easy to dismiss.

little security bit

http://www.kiplinger.com/personalfinance/magazine/archives/2006/11/mystory.html

I am guessing all the CJ majors out there will be saying "well DUH!" to this but I thought it was interesting that there are much fewer pickpockets in the US based on ENFORCEMENT. Generally when I talk about things like this prevention is the accepted way to go.

Absurd useless gadgets and gadgets that might be absurdly useful

Hello ladies and gentlemen, and welcome.

I found some interesting things upon waking up. The first was this little beauty

This is not a joke, here is the hyperlink for where you can buy one http://www.thinkgeek.com/gadgets/tools/8b97/?cpg=38H

I have to imagine that most of you find this at least somewhat absurd. This thing weighs almost 3 lbs, and is 8.75 inches wide. I think that renders ALL the tools in it essentially useless. It has grow so large and awkward it is almost unusable. As a programmer I understand this problem (my god is Ross talking about business principles?), you want to make a program that does EVERYTHING because it would be SOOOOOO COOL. However, you put that much functionality into a program and you will be the only one using it, and even you will probably stop after a while (I suspect this happened with the "English system").

I told you about that to tell you about this (well actually I just thought it was funny, and then I related it to what I REALLY wanted to talk about (YAY fun writing fact)). Google, creepy yet wonderful entity that it is, has done one better, again. Google has a lot of fun toys, and I have spent days sorting through them and going "ooooo that one and that one and that one", and this morning, when checking the google blog (which uses Google's atom feed to post summaries on my google personalized homepage) I found what I have been waiting a LONG time for (years I think). Google documents. *angels sing*. This little wonder is something that I think has a TREMENDOUS amount of potential. Basically, it is a simple text editor, with a folder on a server somewhere, that acts just like Word (or pico for those Unix users out there) online, and lets you store the documents you make online.
Ross, that's silly, what does that do that is so wonderful? Well, I am not entirely sure, but it is definitely somewhat useful. For instance, you can collaborate on documents, that means that two (or more) different people can access and edit it. This is without having to send the file to different people, working at your own computers, or even working at the Internet cafe down the street from your hotel while you are visiting friends in Rome. Having the document reside online is useful to a pretty neat degree, you can choose to share it with the public so that they can only read it, or share it with all your friends and choose who can read and who can write. You can make a club journal the officers can write in and the members can read. It is flexible.
In addition, there are a lot of other google products with similar principles. google spreadsheets, Gmail, Google personalize home page, blogger (hey!), Google groups, picasa. All of these things reside ONLINE and have the same flexibility, accessibility, and convenience. The only thing left is hosting things like Photoshop, or Maple online. As a friend pointed out "at that point it is possible to treat every computer with an Internet connection as a terminal". Everything you need is at a location you can access remotely, you can choose permission writes and share with all your friends.
This is interesting, in, oh I don't remember, '98? people were proving the power of the Internet by proving that they could live, at home, without contact to the outside world other than the Internet, for a year (or something like that). Basically, I can LIVE on the Internet, make money, get food, have fun, meet people, buy funny looking lamps, whatever, ALL on the Internet. And I acknowledge that point, my counterpoint however is, "why would you want to?". I think it is interesting that this is, in a way, a reversal of that. It is providing us access to our computers, our funny little data centers, everywhere else. Now we don't have to stay at home, haul our laptops around, or even worry about E-mailing someone documents or spreadsheets. FREEDOM! FREEDOM I SAY!

...

...

AHEM!...

Anyway, I was just wondering what this means for the future, especially if I can (and I hope to) implement all of this neat technology together. I certainly know I will use it in Role playing games, when I design games, when I am working on things (imagine doing your finances with your spouse from wherever either or both of you are). I feel so... CONNECTED. What do you guys think? What will you use it for? Will you use it? Why? Why not?



oh, and also, why is left blue and right red? (I mean clearly there is the right and red both begin with R thing, but it seems pretty universal.)

Knowledge and google

Hello, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome,

     I got to thinking today. When a friend asks me to define a word, or what something is, I tend to suggest that they wiki it or look to google. This has led to a number of thoughts.
     First, the reason that I tell people to look to the internet is because I feel it is more likely to give a better and more accurate explination for it. But that also means that I fall out of the practice of explaining things. I understand the importance of delegation in today's society but I think that the fact that I keep directing people to the net rather than explaining myself is literally handicapping myself. I feel that even if I have mastered something (and lets face it I haven't mastered anything so I could be wrong) without practice that skill with wither away and disappear. So doing so is almost harmful to myself.
     Second, the first reason I tend to point to google or wiki is that I feel they are more likely to produce a more easily understood example. This is based on the assumption that given such a large pool of explinations as the internet, one is more likely to find an explination that will make it clear given one's own personal understanding of things. This makes sense but has more flaws than I orginially realized. The first is that one cannot really ask questions of the internet in order to clarify points. It is possible, but often inefficient. One could post to forums, pay money to ask researchers (nifty little google feature that is), or E-mail someone that knows with the question. That, however, requires time, sometiems money, and usually a lot more effort than people are willing to put in. Also, and more importantly, the explination online may be misleading. I find that even if a definition is sound, without the ability to clarify points it can be interpreted VERY differently.
     Third, the second reason I tend to point to the net is that I feel the definitions will be more accurate as they will inevitably be the most common and agreed upon definition. Most of you already see the problem, since when has the most agreed upon answer been the right one? I know, I know, but I still felt it worked because the majority and the average would be the definitions you were most likely to come across. Even better, this extends even to rarer and more esoteric knowledge as the net is large enough to find an average with that as well. And then, all comfortable in my little bubble, I thought, "yeah, but that doesn't mean that is what I think it is". I realized that half the time people ask me these questions they don't want to know what the world thinks, they want to know what I think.
     In the end I guess that I am just going to have to try to explain the best i can and save google and wiki for backup. If someone doesn't like my definition I can send them there, or if I feel in doubt I can tell them they might want to check with other sources first. But I think that I have to start explaining things myself, even if it is that grass is pushed up out of the ground by trolls.

Goodnight.

Dreams

Some people will tell you not to dream, to set reachable goals and strive for things you can do. Don't listen, do what you want, break it down and make every step a step toward your dreams. I have heard it said that dreams aren't dreams if they are reachable. I disagree, I think reaching your dreams is a wonderful thing, and I think when you get there you should give yourself a pat on the back and take a little break and start dreaming again.
     What I DON'T quite understand is when dreams seem to be things I have no real desire to do. In the end I just want to help my friends. Yes just that, and no it is no more selfish than anything else. I really just want to be there for all of them, I want to be able to offer shelter and comfort, and someone to talk to when they are down. I want to give 'em a good kick in the rump when they are wallowing and hold them when they hurt. In the end that is the only thing I have ever really had the motive to do through and through. I am going to be a psych major now, maybe that will help. I don't know though, I am told you are not supposed to be friends with your patients or let your friends be patients, but I feel like we are all each others therapists in the end, to the best of our ability.

Is it worth it? Still don't know, there are a lot of things I don't know, but maybe, for once, I should follow my own advice and make every step a step toward that goal.

Just a quick post before I get to writing the main one.

Thought you might find this interesting.

PLANETS!

Which one is real?

I thought today we could play a little game. Which one of these photos is the real one?



A.)


B.)


C.)

Today is learning day

Hello ladies and gentlemen, and welcome.

Today I shant batter you with mad rants about the war, complaints about the system, or the frustration that I feel towards the human condition. No, TODAY will be about learning. Not learning anything in particular, or learning how to learn (which is a term I both loath and agree with), but rather learning something.

I watch Ze Frank all the time; as frequently as possible in fact. Why? Well, I suppose it is because he entertains me. Yet, I feel I get more out of it than simply something to giggle to myself about and kill 3 minutes with. I think I feel this way because he says something that sticks with me, on just about every show. Ze is intelligent, I will not defend that but I do believe it, and more than that he has a way with words. He probably spends some absurd amount of time editing and writing and carefully making each episode, so it is very likely that we are being given some view of him that only exists through the window of the internet. Still, that doesn't make his points less profound, his wording any less sharp and penetrating, and his humor any more memorable and entertaining. To quote Joshua Foer, the reigning U.S.A. memory champion, "As it turns out the two things evolution has programmed us to find most interesting are jokes and sex". I cannot know Ze's motives, or even if he has any behind his video blog, but I do know that what he does works. Putting humor together with things will help anyone remember them.

This is important. In 1835, hell probably in 1935, the idea of educating someone was to give them some manner of information (more often then not a table) and tell them to memorize it. This way when they needed to use it in the future, it would be there, permanently ground into their brain. Problem is memorizing is so painfully boring it is easier to cram for a test, until you are practically suffocating on memorized terms, and then regurgitate them onto the test. After you have thoroughly purged your system of the information you can forget it until the next test that may or may not contain it. This is more than just a problem in high school. For a long time I thought, "college will be different, they understand how education works better, they will let me do things that are interesting, they will involve me." Alright, I concede it is better, but it isn't much different. There is the same old memorization, same old, "I am saying this... as slowly as possible... because it is something...you need to write down... word for word...and read until you say it in your sleep". It's all still there. Some of the more successful approaches I have seen students take to this is to add their own humor. My roommate, to this day, remembers "avocado's number" (for those non-chemists in the room it is a reference to the mole constant and its inventor Count Lorenzo Romano Amedeo Carlo Avogadro di Quaregna e Cerreto). Yes, it is lame, yes, it probably doesn't have you in stitches right now, but at the time, it was pretty funny, and it sure as hell helped us remember it, to this day.

So, to the professors, the teachers, the tutors, the parents, the adults, the neighbors, the guardians, the TA's, student teachers, volunteers, gurus, mentors, friends, and families, that are in any way responsible for someone's education, please, PLEASE, make it interesting. Add some humor. It doesn't even have to be terribly good humor (I leave that distinctions to your own standards), just something to help your students remember what the hell you were talking about twenty minutes ago. I know a lot of teachers that crack jokes in class solely to keep themselves awake. Here is a secret, it keeps the students awake too. My calculus class has both an entertaining professor and what would once have contemptuously been referred to as "class clowns". Alright, they aren't perfect and they really disrupt the class sometimes, but out of every calculus class I have been in (and trust me I have been in a number of them) I have never seen the students so awake. I have not once seen someone in that class fall asleep.

So, quick summary, memorization is necessary sometimes, but where it isn't (or if you are clever enough even where it is), using humor helps with EVERYTHING. It will keep the professor and the students awake in class (you think I am kidding about how many college kids I see asleep in their chairs? I swear it is the fluorescent lights), it will help the students remember all the information they need to more easily and for a longer period, and it will help people find the class interesting, and probably cut down on the amount of kids cutting class. NO not every professor is likely to agree to this, some of them may get stuffy and call me a fool who knows nothing about education, some of them may just say that it is both disrespectful to the professor and to the discipline. Not all kids will be swayed by this, some kids just think college is about parties, sports, drinking, promiscuity, getting away from home, etc. and I honestly don't know how to reach them (these things are not necessarily bad, they are just divergent from the point of an educational institute, that being education.). Some professors can reach them, they are greater men and women than I. Still, it will make a difference.

Alrighty, so, education needs to change, I think we all agree. A joke now and then won't hurt, but before you get the idea that I think that is a cure all (even given my few cautionary statements) I will point out a few other things that might bear some scrutiny.


First, what is intelligence? This whole piece is done MUCH better by Sir Ken Robinson

HERE:


But I am still going to write about it (hopefully quickly) so that I can put my opinion out there. Intelligence has been slowly distilled into math ability. How this happened or even why is beyond me (at the moment, I am sure motive and method are there if the research is done, I am just lazy). I think it is pretty silly though. The arts and sciences colleges seem to be shrinking while tech schools and things like the college of mathy math math (also known as Computer Science) seem HUGE. But is someone that can describe, in words that evoke the feeling, a sunset on the beach with a loved one, or a rainy day spent playing games with someone that is no longer around, any less intelligent than someone that can program a funny little box with the square root algorithm that will help you pass your calc test (because NOBODY has the square root algorithm memorized)? I am dead serious, because the man that can make you remember things that hurt and things that were beautiful, and made you feel better than you had ever felt before, in this day and age, isn't likely to get a job, or a degree people will care about, but the guy with the little box has a job and a degree people will oo and ahh. In fact, we are doing a good job of finding kids with some amazing talents and scooping them up young, stamping "ADHD" or "DYSLEXIC" on their forehead, feeding them pills and throwing them in a room with a teacher who will insist they don't know what they say they know.

Alright, COUNTER-POINT. Blah blah blah survival of the fittest. Blah blah blah medication valid in some cases. Blah blah blah some disabilities resulting in "lack of intelligence" really do succeed in inhibiting intelligence. In some cases I will admit that the administration of medication to "fix" a problem helps. These cases are generally the cases in which I feel it hasn't inhibited the other talents of the individual. Would rain man be rain man if they had just "fixed" him? Suddenly I feel like I am alluding to one flew over the cuckoo's nest. In some cases it is true, people do have actual inhibitions to learning, not just different styles of learning. A lot of the time we like to say that there is something wrong with a person if said person does not conform adequately to the "norm" (YAY normalcy *kerplow*). And finally, I will concede that some people are just stupid, actually (I know I am being an optimist here) I am going to say foolish. I have plenty of people about me that seem to truly HATE learning. They go out of their way to avoid learning anything. I personally cannot understand this.


*Whew* I just don't shut up do I?


Alright now on to what I THOUGHT I was going to be writing about in this entry. NEW TECH! Everyone loves new technology (alright not the luddites but they are nearly extinct and we don't care about them today). I mean it is all smooth, and shiny, and comes in a fun wrapper with starbursts and lots of exclamation marks and all kinds of things that should excite us like a dog about to be given half a smoked ham. Alright, I suppose I sound a little hostile there, but I guess I just like to dismiss covers entirely if I can (especially when it comes to books or anything that can be bought in bestbuy, staples, target, wal mart, etc). Still, this is a good thing. Technology makes our lives easier, ever seen a chimp try to open a bottle of wine? Today's little techno gadget is VIDEO! YAY VIDEO! Wait, what? That isn't new, you lied to me you bas.. HEY! Let me finish. Google video (still not terribly new) is doing a very google thing and compiling a bunch of videos (YAY wait...). One section of videos they are compiling seem to be educational videos. No not abs of steel, nor Martha Stewart's guide to stuff with painted macaroni on it. No, I mean videos of actual college courses. Given my current occupation (not what I am doing right this moment but rather the job I have) I would say that they were originally distance learning videos, but now, they are online, AND FREE!


Yes, dare I say it but there is a chance, that something resembling free education, is now out in the world. No it is in no way certified, and thus does no damage to higher education businesses, er.. I mean institutions. But it will provide me with INFORMATION with LEARNING with education on various things that I might be interested in, without charging me some obscene amount of money per class.

I advise you at least look at the videos

HERE:
http://video.google.com/ucberkeley.html


And here are the rest of the TED videos where I got that Sir Ken video from.

http://video.google.com/ted.html




that is all for today.