Asymptomatic

There must be intelligent life down here

Bored with the Internet
September 14, 2011

Sometime late last night, I became bored with the internet. It finally occurred to me simply that nothing new is happening, and even if it was, it’s all happening inside the computer. And basically, who cares?

Prior to last night, it seemed like the internet was a never ending source of new things. But the reality is that the new things are made out in the real world, and simply reported on via the internet. Moreover, the tings that can be new on the internet - new tools and websites - simply make it easier to manage what’s online, or our lives entwined there, and serve no real purpose outside of the internet where someone hadn’t figured out how to solve these problems years ago.

Dungeonmorph Dice
September 12, 2011

I recently won a contest to receive a prototype Dungeonmorph Die from the kickstarter campaign that I backed a few months ago. I had written about Kickstarter before, so I’ll focus solely on the die I received from the project.

The Dungeonmorph Dice are six-sided dice that display a small, square portion of a dungeon on each side. The sides are numbered, so they can be used as regular six-sided dice, but their primary purpose is to be used to create random dungeons. You simply roll a handful of these dice, assemble them together (all of the flat edges will join), and you have a random dungeon waiting to be explored.

Fitbit tracks my physical activities
September 07, 2011

The Fitbit, as far as I can tell, is a perfect device. What is a Fitbit? Fitbit is a device and a website that you can use to track your physical activity. Yes, at first glance, the Fitbit is essentially an electronic pedometer, but it is actually a lot more.

Fitbit in boxFirstly, let me say that the Fitbit packaging design rivals anything Apple produces – it’s pretty. The box is small and contains a lot. You get the Fitbit device itself, the charging/syncing stand, a belt clip, and a wrist strap. To start, you install some software on your PC and plug the stand into a USB port. Registering the Fitbit device to your computer is simple. You set the device on the stand, press the button, and type the code that appears into the software on the PC. This simplistic setup is very much appreciated in the age of complicated devices. The Fitbit just works.

What I Want in a Tablet
September 02, 2011

There’s no shortage of tablet devices available today, and demand for them seems pretty high. Scanning through Engadget, it seems like we’ve got a good stock coming in the future, too. The problem, as I see it, is that the future tablets that everyone is so excited about are exciting (at least to media outlets like Engadget) for the wrong reasons.

Tablet onlookers seem enticed by the latest versions of operating systems, faster processors, and additional cell network capabilities. The latest versions of iOS and Android certainly are improvements over prior versions, but they don’t add anything groundbreaking or genre-defining to the fundamental features of a tablet. Faster processors are nice of course, but they also tempt battery drain, which is an essential, oft-overlooked feature of a tablet. The latest LTE connections are certainly alluring as our dependence on the cloud and correlating bandwidth needs increase, though the dependence on cell networks and their high-cost plans are strange things to look forward to. I think there are other things that we should concentrate on for producing the “fundamental tablet”.

My Earthquake Experience
August 23, 2011

I write this after the 5.9 magnitude earthquake that hit central Virginia about an hour ago. I’m recalling the exact personal circumstances of the event, since all I’m hearing in the news is a bunch of people saying simply “I felt shaking”.

I’ve been working at home all day, as usual, sitting at my desk. I was reading through some code for a project I’m working on, when I started to ask myself why I couldn’t seem to focus on the text on the screen. I sat back a bit and looked at my monitors as a whole. They were shaking. The top one, which is wall-mounted, was swinging back and forth slightly on its arm. I looked over to the planter for the hops, where I have four long bamboo poles for the vines to climb on. All four of them were swaying like they were in a heavy wind.