Murmurist

This is funny. Puzzling, but funny.

"Such a pointed term." I love it.

Who is he? Who is he writing to? A real person? Where is the supposed previous correspondence?

Will the author explain?

It actually reminds me of ideas I had for web sites when the web was young. There are so many things you can do with it which does not have to follow the logic of the ordinary world.

It also reminded me of an article I read over thirty years ago in Mad Magazine. Called something like "I had to work to reach bottom", it was an unfinished account of somebody's childhood, and somehow seemed like writing which purposefully was devoid of meaning and yet demonstrated that that is impossible. Except if the author is empty, in which case he would never do it on purpose. I found it oddly compelling. At the bottom it said "continued on page 121". The magazine had only sixty pages or so.

Vertical time

I wanted to try to embed a video. I've no idea why that never occurred to me before.

Who knew that Time runs vertically?

Haiti UFO

Computer graphics video is getting very advanced.
Regarding this UFO hoax, it seems that it's so well made that even experts couldn't tell for sure, until somebody spotted an unnecessary mistake with some trees.
In other words: in the future, we can expect to see a lot of videos where we simply never will be sure if it is real or computer-generated.

Of course if it's true what philosophers tell us that the world comes from the mind, the difference may be neglible.

Here's a nice demo reel of the software that apparently made it. (And that might explain who made it and posted it. The Blair Witch effect.)

Usability

Am I the only one who gets annoyed by sites like this otherwise nice one?

There are so many sites these days where the moment you enter, you're trapped in a Flash maze. The sites takes over the window, decides the size of the window, decides the size of the text for you, you can't copy text or pictures, you can't open pages in new windows, everything is in menus... Plus they are often slow and have unjustified animation. They are designed to impress rather than be used.

Around the millennium I studied usability, mainly Jakob Nielsen's book on it (Web Usability). It says you need to make things work as much as possible like people are used to, and you need to give the user maximum self-determinism (for example, fit the size of the text to his eyes).

Update: Terrell blogs this.

Sharpness

If you are interested in picture sharpness and camera sensor sizes, there are some insightful comments to an article by some very sharp people here.

Grey pigeon, red berries

BTW, about focus: this is actually shot through my vertical blinds! Due to the long focal length (again image stabilization helps immensely, couldn't have taken this picture without it), depth of field is so slight that the blinds in the foreground are so blurred as to be virtually invisible. I shot it through the blinds, because as I suspected, as soon as I drew them, the bird flew away.

By the way, "to draw the blinds" (or curtains), does that mean to close them or open them? ... (looking it up) According to the dictionary, it means either. A bit messy that. Like "to tie up" and "to tie down" meaning the same thing.

Download speed

I have been bitching a little about the poor internet connections I have available where I live. But I am suspecting more and more that it is not a matter of the pipe into my house, as much as a matter of the larger picture. One reason for this realization is that sometimes downloads are very fast indeed. For instance Apple.com downloads. A couple days ago I downloaded a TV episode (Heroes), half a GB, in fifteen minutes. And today I had a download from Rapidshare.com clocking in at 800kb/sec! This is a first for me, usually I consider anything over 200k to be fast.
But my point is, the variation is just immense. It seems to be large parts of the Net making those variations. Because with the right server my connection seems very capable.

F.Y.I.

I was just thinking today: the term "F.Y.I." (For Your Information) is really redundant, isn't it? What other reason do you have to tell somebody something other than to inform them?

And in that vein, I just got this:
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Stephen Wright Musings

Here's a few amusing thoughts, tidbits and nuggets that have been rolling around in the mind of comedian Stephen Wright:

* I planted some bird seed. A bird came up. Now I don't know what to feed it.

* I had amnesia once - maybe twice

* All I ask is a chance to prove money can't make me happy.

* What is a "free" gift? Aren't all gifts free?

* They told me I was gullible... and I believed them.

* Two can live as cheaply as one. For half as long.

* Experience is the thing you have left when everything else is gone.

* What if there were no hypothetical questions?

* One nice thing about egotists, they don't talk about other people.

* When the only tool you own is a hammer, every problem begins to look like a nail.

* What was the greatest thing before sliced bread?

* I used to be indecisive. Now I'm not sure.

* The high cost of living hasn't affected its popularity.

* How can there be self-help "groups?"

* The speed of time is one second per second.

* Is it possible to be totally partial?

* What's another word for thesaurus?

* Is Marx's tomb a communist plot?

* If a number 2 pencil is the most popular, why is it still number 2?

* It's not an optical illusion, it just looks like one.

Fun videos

Meryl Streep accepting an award for Emma Thompson.

"Ellen": Emma Thompson on Potter and Pole Dancing.

Meryl Streep on "Ellen".

Emma Thompson about Stranger Than Fiction. (A wonderful movie I saw recently.)

Out of Sale

On the chest of a barmaid from Sale
Was tattooed all the prices of ale
Whilst on her behind
For the sake of the blind
Was precisely the same, but in braille.

The quest for sanity

The quest for sanity takes a lifetime. If you don't make it, you may have to take one more.
- Stobblehouse

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Just for instance, I'm only now noticing that I'm a bit obsessive. Far from OCD territory, but enough that I know I would be well off with less. For instance, I will spend hours finding a bit of software that I well know I may never actually use. Just because I got it into my head that I want it. (As was the case with the texture making software a few weeks ago.)

Recently I am also noticing how all actors in the past decade have gotten their teeth whitened. It looks odd when they are playing people in historical times. (Example: Tom Cruise in "The Latest Samurai".*)

Also, the line "let's get out of here" in films. It's rumored to be the most used line ever, and I can believe it. I notice it now all the time. :)

* Or whatever it was called. Not too exciting a movie. It was about "honor". Apparently that concept means to kill those opposing your friends, until you discover that your friends are worse, then you kill them instead.
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TTL injected:
Sanity is other people's idea of how you should act and behave. Why would you want to quest for that?

Good point. This is often how "sanity" is perceived. And funny enough, this is of course an insane idea of it.
I'm not talking about behavior. And definitely not "normal" behavior, whatever that is. I'm talking about clear thinking and clear perceptions, free from the robotic endoctrinations and emotions that we are under from society and from our very humanness.

Don't ask me what totally clear perceptions would reveal. Perhaps one would not even be really human if and when one has them.

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Michael said:
Mark Vonnegut's book is about himself. I believe he suffered a form of schizophrenia. It got particularly bad at a time when the counter-cultural acceptance of individual difference was at its height. As a result, he thinks that slowed recognition that he had a serious problem.

As he tells his story, it becomes increasingly clear that he was not just expressing his unique world-view -- he was seriously, seriously ill.

In the end, he still embraces the "live and let live" counter-culture acceptance of individual differences, but he has shown that, yes, it really is possible to be insane. And it's terrifying.

It might not sound like it, but I thought it was a very uplifting book.

Yes, insanity is indeed frightening.

Slightly related, I recently read Carrie Fisher's book The Best Awful, partially about a nervous breakdown.

The film Vampire's Kiss with Nicolas Cage is one of the best films I've seen about a man going insane. Although it's very unusual, it can be seen as a comedy or a fantasy film or whatnot.

Icon wars

I'm sure some of you have seen this one before, but I think it's fun. Icon War.
I love how the neighboring icons are bothered by the fighting.
(Notice that the pictures seems to stretch, following your window.)
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Update: Hannah pointed to this wonderful animation.