Occasional Roborant » mark

Bob Dylan’s not really known for the clarity of his speech…

mark — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 00:41:25 +0000

…but he’s thinking about doing voice work for GPS navigation systems?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/8219449.stm

Maybe it only works on those wandering 3 AM drives when you don’t really care where you end up.

Kindles and Bookshelves

mark — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 00:15:30 +0000

In my last post, I mentioned that I read The Right Stuff via Kindle. It was my first purchase of an Amazon e-book, and I read it on my iPhone. A common theme across the blogosphere concerning the Kindle, and ebooks in general, follows the refrain “oh no, if all my books are digital, however will everyone know how literate I am, since there won’t be such impressive bookshelves to display!”

The answer, until we get wall-sized displays which can simply display all your book covers, like iTunes displays album covers, is to make blog posts advertising just what you’ve been reading. Clearly.

Update: Kevin Drum explains some of the reasons trees will keep dying for a while yet.

The Right Stuff, and James May’s lackthereof

mark — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 00:11:33 +0000

I finally got around to reading The Right Stuff this weekend, an impulse buy of the Kindle edition. I had seen the movie a few years back, and it had been on my radar to read it since then. It’s a classic, so I hardly need to describe it, but what struck me as the most interesting thought, which had never really emerged from the movie, was the idea of astronaut as personification of single combat. Mano-a-mano against the cosmonauts, proving that Americans were braver, more talented, had more of the right stuff.

Then I watched the James May on the Moon documentary, and was struck by how much was lifted from the book, even the catchphrase, without any mention of Wolfe. They neglected to pick up the “astronaut as champion” role as well. And maybe Wolfe felt it was time to raise the point again, because his editorial in the New York Times today focuses solely on that point, and how once the combat was complete, the Soviets vanquished, there was no longer the same psychological need for the manned space program.

via Jalopnik, the Daily Dish

Grilled Shrimp Satay with Peaches and Bok Choy

mark — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 01:08:05 +0000

from epicurious

Worked out pretty well, although the chili paste I used was a little underpowered, more of a slow afterburn than a quick kick to the tongue. I ended up using apricot nectar instead of peach, it’s what I could find.

Oh, and natural peanut butter is the most disgusting-looking ingredient I’ve ever cooked with.

Weekend Office

mark — Sun, 19 Jul 2009 18:51:14 +0000

Not too shabby…

Downtown Boston from Spectacle Island

mark — Sun, 19 Jul 2009 18:50:30 +0000

click for a few more at flickr

The mafia sends death threats via ipod?

mark — Sat, 18 Jul 2009 21:45:59 +0000

And here I thought they were all about the personal, face-to-face forms of intimidation. Guess I was wrong.

Wait long enough, and things become apropos again

mark — Sat, 18 Jul 2009 15:21:38 +0000

From the depths of the starred items in Google Reader comes…

With the folks I work with, every time Apollo gets mentioned, we come back to the point that the computers on board were significantly less advanced than the cell phones in everyone’s pockets.

via sparkfun.com

I’d wear these on a tshirt

mark — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 01:20:49 +0000

Russian matchbox labels referencing the space program:

on flickr, via Sci-Fi-O-Rama

Gorgeous visualizations of… random data

mark — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 01:17:26 +0000

http://www.random-walk.com/

via datavisualization.ch