Archive for December, 2008

9002

December 30th, 2008

I’m no Zarathustra or Nostradamus, and i’m a bit lazy, so i’ll leave off the predictions. Resolutions are possible, though – the only thing we can hope to control is, possibly, ourselves.

Last year i made some, and forgot about them immediately. Now i can check whether i realized them (doh).
Let’s see:

Professionally – yep, did most of what i wanted to do. Could do better on the AI front.
Personal: sheesh, not so good.
- Didn’t go anywhere (except a conference in Berlin)
- didn’t do either singing or wood working. Started doing Ashtanga yoga though, happy about that.
- I am marginally less shy, but i expect that’s just continuing the trend of these last 33 years.
- This blog is doing OK, but with lapses.
- Let’s not even get into the really personal stuff, that would only be depressing.

Ahum.
OK, I’ll make new ones … one can only try.

get a haircut (start small …)
really travel this time. I’m working on a paper for a conference far, far away. If that fails, i’ll just book a trip anyway. As a matter of fact, i’m going to do a Last Minute before starting my new assignment, in a couple of weeks. Yeeeeeehaw
stick my nose into mobile applications and pervasive computing
expand my social life (in more than one way …)
keep things interesting generally – seize the day

That should work ! Bring it on.

3 comments »

Posted in life

Tags: life resolutions

Burn-E

December 26th, 2008

Burn-E from Ivan Petrov on Vimeo.
hee hee
(thanks ilpleut)

2 comments »

Posted in movies

Tags: anime wall-e

Wishes

December 26th, 2008

Midwinter holidays are always a strange time.

First you have the intense kitch of christmas, hanukka, newtonmas, midwinter solstice or however you call it. This may, or may not be, the time to revive some old arguments with your family, or start new ones. Lots of food is consumed, presents are exchanged around the tree (with or without sneaky glances at what others got).

I personally quite like it, because i’m blessed with a fun and relaxed family, but i can imagine that it can be a cause of stress. Not to mention spending christmas alone must make you feel like the last of rejects, which is unnecessary.

Then there’s New Year, aka the compulsory annual piss-up. For some strange reason, one is supposed to have fun. You have to. There’s no way around it.

But at the same time, such dates are also the time to reminisce, to make a balance of the last year, to formulate wishes for the next. There may be times where that’s not so cheerful. And so, until a few years ago, this was the cue for me to drink (more). And this didn’t make it a whole lot better – hangover next day guaranteed.

So my wish to you is: may this be a peaceful time. The days will get longer again (they already started), and if your mood is dark because of the lack of sunlight, rest assured that it will get better. May the next solar revolution bring joy, health and prosperity to you and yours !

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Posted in life

Tags: new year wishes

Moving on

December 22nd, 2008

You might know that i’ve been working on a startup project these last few months. I’ve now decided to hand over my developments (in exchange of a small percentage of future revenue), to let my partner continue.

My mistake was that I didn’t know my partner very well before starting. It turned out that, personality-wise, we were not that compatible. And it also turned out that for me, that is very important. The ability to joke around, ping-pong ideas in an easy way, is a first requirement for me to feel good working in that small a team.

(not to say the guy isn’t a honest, decent guy, because i think he is)

So anyway, I’m handing over the start of this platform (3 months’ worth). If you feel in startup mood, and you’re doing Ruby on Rails, you can contact me – i’ll patch you through. I think it could work, and have a nice ROI eventually – the business model is sound.

For myself, I already have a nifty project lined up for start of next year, so i’m looking forward to that. It was an instructive experience. I’m looking forward to try again sometime, with this lesson under my belt.

6 comments »

Posted in RoR, Ruby, startup

Tags: rails startup

Spam entrapment

December 14th, 2008

Say you make a random mailbox (hotmail, gmail, whatever).
Then you put the corresponding address a bit everywhere on your blog, your web pages, but styled so it’s in visible (display:none).
Then you install a little application, and you give it the necessary data to retrieve the mail corresponding to that address (pop, imap, whatever).
This application parses incoming mails, stores the ip’s and addresses in a file. At the end of every month, this file gets sent automatically to a few spam blacklisters (ideal format to be examined).

This application is spread as much as possible, on as many platforms as possible.
Do you think it could work ? What would be your suggestions ?

7 comments »

Posted in software, spam

Tags: community software spam

Disturbing

December 12th, 2008

Tonight, over a couple of cocktails, my friend Melissa and I were (amongst other subjects) reminiscing about MTV clips (of our youth, I don’t have a TV) (and I wouldn’t watch MTV if I did). What struck us is that the ones we remember are the most disturbing ones.

For instance, “Black Hole Sun” by Soundgarden:

Or worse, the one with Aphex Twin and the teddy bears:

An example from another context, the posters from the Saw movies:

It’s all in the nails. You don’t like it, but you sure as hell remember it.

Long-term marketing: what remains with you is not the nice and pretty, nor even the sexy stuff. What sticks are the images that connect with the darkest corners of our subconscious.

2 comments »

Posted in Uncategorized

Crazy Kitchen

December 7th, 2008

And i’m not gonna talk about Gordon Ramsay. Rather about this hip phenomenon called ‘molecular cooking‘ (at least it was hip last year, don’t know what its rating is now).

Check this out: where science meets food.

I haven’t tasted it, so i can’t be sure, but i think i’d prefer my own favourite recipe of carrot cake. Interesting though.

If you’re interested, click through to Youtube: lots more where that came from …

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Posted in Uncategorized

Ultimate Fighting

December 6th, 2008

The other night, in an irish pub, the large-screen tvs were displaying some Ultimate Fighting.

(for some reason, i sometimes confuse the words with ‘Mortal Combat’, which, as oldtimers know, was an extremely violent game from the end of the eighties. When you’d punched your opponent into submission, the famous words appeared: ‘Finish him’. By doing ctrl-alt-shift-3-B or similar you could do your secret technique to either rip the spine out of him, freeze him and break him into bits, or other bloody endings)

Anyway. So you’ve got an round pitch which is delimited by an iron mesh fence. The fighters arrive with a maximum of show and a whole retinue of minions, a bit in wrestling style. They’ve each got teeth protection and (i think) a shell.

The arbitrator calls the start of the fight. For as far as i could see, there are no rules at all. Pure savagery. Mix of judo, wrestling, kickboxing, plain boxing, whatever comes to mind.

Get as many punches in as you can, wherever you can. Pound his face, and barring that, his ribs into mush. Rip his neck, his arm, back as far as they will go. I’ve not seen any biting or scratching, but that’s about it. The iron mesh can come in handy as a tool of destruction.

We stare transfixed at the screen. Anyone with a shred of empathy would wince at any number of points. They slough on, standing up, then one on top or the other, beating, wrenching.

One of the fighters gets the upper hand, and the match is called. They both stand up. The loser is swaying slightly. He has a face like a red pin cushion, and his eyes are black holes lost in the pink tissue. They shake hands.

Then the program segues to a studio, where two guys in suits and ties and an immaculately dressed woman are about to discuss the ~~game~~ fight.

Whatever they’re paying those twenty-somethings, it can’t nearly be enough.

photo from the NYTimes

No comments »

Posted in life, sports

Candles

December 2nd, 2008

This year, like last few years, I’m selling candles and other knick-knacks for Amnesty International. I’ve had a sort of lateral promotion into the Amnesty world: last few years i’ve stood in stations and metro stops, which was cold to very cold and wet. This year I’m part of a local group, and we sell candles in supermarkets. Definitely more comfortable.

It’s fun, in a queer way: a study of human nature. In fact, the only people who buy anything are people who already wanted to. This represents about 10% of passers-by. The rest:

speed up
avert their eyes and appear engrossed in a poster advertising a promotion for canned soup
say, with righteous anger, that they don’t agree with Amnesty, and then run away
mention they already have 20 candles at home
poke around for a while, say they don’t have small change, and leave

The ones who buy are rarely the ones you would expect. And you cannot categorize them either, you have all kinds of people from all classes of the population.

Amnesty doesn’t accept any subsidy or funding from governments, to stay as independent as possible. As a consequence it needs to get money elsewhere, from donations, but also from misc sales.

This year it’s the 60th anniversary of the Declaration of Human Rights. I’ll happily pay money to other NGO’s who combat hunger, disease, commercial exploitation. But the freedom to express an opinion, to gather, and to do what is necesary, is the first requirement for anything to change.

And i’m starting to sound like a neo-hippie. So be it

2 comments »

Posted in ethics, life

Tags: AI amnesty Human Rights