Instead of writing a post tonight I wrote an email to a friend. Remember that? Writing an email to a friend? It was like letters that you would send, through the post office. “Remember me when I am killed at war,” I imagine them seeming like. It was a long time ago, but before email, people would literally put pen to paper to compose a letter to a friend. Eh, maybe I’m being too stupidly nostalgic. But times are weird, man. It always feels good to be thought of, and the opposite of fascism is community. Write...
Continue reading...Technology
What even is TV now
I wake up, in what amounts to some kind of haze. I’ve never been much of a morning person, so usually it takes an hour or so to just get back to cogent thought. If I have nothing urgent to do (work, or commuting to work, or the sporadic brunch appointment), I’ll shuffle downstairs, plop onto the couch, and throw on the television. What do I watch? Who cares. It doesn’t matter. So I fire up Hulu with Live TV, the modern equivalent of cable, and see what is airing live. Turns out, these days, it’s nothing....
Continue reading...Plumbing the series of tubes
Did the internet somehow break while I was away? Did something change in the past 30 or so years since the internet went mainstream? Because there are a couple of weird undercurrents happening right now, in earnest, with great urgency, that seem to suggest that maybe something changed about the internet that really needs fixing. First, for some reason, laws requiring age identification are sweeping not just around the US, but globally. Why now? Well, at least in the US, the Supreme Court changed its mind and said it’s okay now. Sure, fine, whatever, they’ve been doing...
Continue reading...Energy blogging
We’re currently living through two trends that are quickly converging with force. First, the electrification of the energy system: a long-running focus of environmentalists, who know that there is no way to combat climate change without changing things that run on fossil fuels to work off the electric grid. Sure, the electric grid currently is pretty dirty, but it’s long been far cleaner than burning straight fossil fuels, and the electric grid has the capability to get cleaner. So, we have things like cars, stoves, hot water heaters, furnaces, etc., joining the electric grid in massive numbers....
Continue reading...Wake up in the morning feeling like [REDACTED]
WSJ reports that President Trump is going to give TikTok another extension to get their shit together make a effort to be legal: President Trump is planning to give TikTok another lifeline. With a mid-June deadline approaching and trade talks with China in limbo, Trump is expected to sign an executive order staving off enforcement of a law banning or forcing the sale of the app, according to people familiar with his plan. It would be the third extension since Trump took office in January. The current one expires June 19. Just a note that this, once...
Continue reading...Watch: This Apple video from 1987 about 1997
Back in 1987, Apple made a (cheeky) video predicting what 1997 would be like. In it, Apple predicts that they will be basically the biggest company ever. Of course, we know that by 1997, they were basically bankrupt. Let\’s at least be happy that basically none of this came true, especially the glasses (or Vista Mac). Make sure you catch the Pepsi joke, as that\’s where John Scully was CEO before joining Apple.
Continue reading...Watch: Supercut of 80s computer hacking
Man, computer hacking in the 80s was really cool.
Continue reading...Breakfast Octopus
Go ahead and read these two paragraphs (go ahead, I\’ll wait for you): So there sat Bezos at the breakfast table, faced with a question for which he was apparently unprepared. Many painful seconds passed without an answer. Rutledge let the pause lengthen as long as he could bear it and was just about to tell his host to forget it, when Bezos finally spoke. He looked down at his plate. Bezos had ordered a dish called Tom’s Big Breakfast, a preparation of Mediterranean octopus that includes potatoes, bacon, green garlic yogurt, and a poached egg. “You’re...
Continue reading...Watch: President Obama plays soccer with a robot
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ag2vk6coBpI] So, this robot pretty much portends our coming doom.
Continue reading...Why is the Spotify player such a piece of shit?
Spotify is a pretty decent service. For free, you can listen to practically anything that’s ever been released commercially (sadly, no RVIVR, but that’s on them because they’re UP THE PUNX), as long as you’re willing to listen to some ads once in a while. And I’m not against listening to ads once in a while. The problem is, for a tech company with so much data, they use it horribly. Or they don’t use it at all. You’ll be listening to a sweet Biber partita, and get thrown a massively loud advertisement for ADVANCED AUTO PARTS. Listening to...
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