One way not to vlog

Lesson learned. Do not click on your own live video podcast/blog.

Me-mememememememe!!!

They still got it.

Notes:

The Saturday morning chaos video had 140 hits the last time I looked. That is about double the number of the highest count on any of the music videos I got at JP's last week. Shows you the way it goes.

One of the podcasts I listen to is in Hawaii.He said it was Chilly. They closed the windows and things started warming up. No mention of turning on a heater or anything. Bastards.

I got a free lunch today. It was awesome. We went to J Alexander's. I had some club sandwich that was fantastic. The guy buying me lunch tried to convince me to get something more expensive. Not sure I could have handled it. No, I took no media. Sorry followers.

Work Politics

I had a code change today that was very easy. the requirement was basically to remove one line of code that controlled a link, and move a file around so it got picked up by another line of code. Very easy manipulation. Why did it take a week? It took a week because I had been specifically told not to do what I was being asked to do a couple months ago. I had to make sure those folks were on board before pulling the trigger on the change.

This took all of twenty minutes to make the changes and almost two hours to test with interruptions. Funny how that works. It took nearly a week to get approval of sorts. Let's call it a consensus.

Ah, politics. The company  work for has become a medium sized company. We are having growing pains and getting to the point where several people do nothing but push paper work around to handle the rest of the people who do work for or on products. Such is the way of modern business. It is perfectly normal and perfectly regular and perfectly a pain in the ass for all involved.

This is punctuated by a sign of a truly medium to large company. This morning we had a pre-meeting-meeting to cover the bullets so t the meeting went well and there were no surprises. Nearly every one in the meeting was in the pre-meeting-meeting.

Yup, watching our little company grow in to a conglomerate. I'm so proud.

Super Bowl

I did not watch the Super Bowl. I did read a summery. It sounds like a nail-biter where the underdog pulled a rabbit out of their hat at the last moment. Not too shabby. Still kind of glad that I didn't watch. It is just a bunch of guys hitting each other with a ball getting tossed around. It is all too involved for me.

it was interesting listening to several day old podcasts on Monday making predictions about the game.  Some guy was interviewed from the New Orleans city government was all about "The Saints are going to take it all. The national media has it wrong." He held the company line for sure. He was completely right too.

Someone had an audio recorder ready on Bourbon Street and captured a general hooray from the crowded bars in the area. Nice. It must be nice having that kind of comradely when that cool of a thing happens to the home team. It reminds me of the sweep the Rockets performed all those years ago and Richmond was simply clogged with people celebrating with brooms in their hands.

Blogs were a bit light yesterday. I noticed several blogs mentioning the game with a 'light posting' notice. Some just didn't post. Some of the professional blogs seemed to make a point of posting something off topic. Some of the gather of the minds kind of blogs had revelries going. those were the interesting ones. If any one had prebuilt, time delayed posts, I didn't notice.

Notes:

When I was very young, someone asked me "What do you want to  be when you grow up?" I answered "Something to do with computers." That is exactly what I got. That should be my job title. "Something to do with computers." That is what I do.

I've caught myself using the camera on my phone several times over the last couple months. Mostly to capture blue Screens of Death on Windows boxes in order to document the crashes. it is easy to snap a  pic and email it to myself. Then it just pops straight in to a ticket. Easy-peasy.

Census workers can make $17 an hour. Where do I sign up? All positions are temporary. Everything in life is temporary if you think about it. The Pyramids are not truly permanent. Thankfully, we don't have to do everything on geologic time scales.

Attempted HTML5

I'm on Ubuntu Linux 9.10. I tried the latest stable Chromium browser loaded via the deb repo from Google with HTML5 and it just plane didn't work. I joined the HTML5 beta on YouTube. The little graphic pops up with "html5" written below it, then nothing. My machine is not downloading anything. The system is just sitting there.

I unjoined the beta and reverted to Flash.

This is a drag because I just know that Linux is going to be the last OS that has any attention paid to it on the HTML5 subject. I was terrified of Silverlight. That is a Microsoft thing. Fortunately, no one really uses it except Microsoft. I have few needs to hit Microsoft pages at home and work only lets Windows boxes on the internet ironically.

People bitch indecently about the lack of Flash on the iPhone and Android. The new iPad (snicker) doesn't support Flash either. Many netbooks have a hard time with it. I have said that a computer should not be allowed to say it can surf the net until it supports Flash. Those days are over.

The Flash project needs an overhaul of biblical proportion to trim it down and turn it from  a land bound walrus to a sparrow in flight. That, or it needs to be abandon on the web completely and replaced by something designed for the needs of our modern era of internet use. Something extensible and scalable. Hopefully, something that is not controlled by one company.

I'm impressed

I noticed off the bat that this is an acrobatic shoot. Still, I'm impressed with that kind of skill from anyone. How in the world do you get good at that sort ofthing. I mean one mess up and it is splatville.

Wander if it is faked somehow. I wander if it is actually a remote controlled device that just looks like a real person below a fancy shoot.

Subaru fun in the snow

Why do they make 4x2 still cars? Oh, yes. Because they are cheaper.

Vlogging vs Blogging

I'm starting to understand the draw to vlogging over standard blogging.

• It is more expressive emotionally. People get the emotions of your face and body language.
  
• It is easier to point a camera at something and describe it than just describe it. You can get away with a far less intense explanation for many things.
• You can easily include willing people and they don't have to do much beyond talking to you normally. Some people are just natural talkers and make for good conversation if not interviews.
  
• Less need to be a good speller. It still doesn't hurt.
  
• You can spend three minutes videoing and three hours editing, but that is part of the fun.
• You can show off other talents, not just describe them.
• People will watch a stupid video longer than read a stupid blog.
  

I do not know what is going to happen when YouTube starts charging. I fear it is inevitable because YouTube looses money on bandwidth. They will have to come up with a model that charges content providers via a straight up charge, or through advertising. People will not pay for YouTube to watch it. The number of vloggers is going up and the number of bloggers is going down. At the moment, YouTube makes a wonderful case for adding content beyond the written word to the internet. It is a fantastic time to be someone who uploads.

With videos it is so much easier to present a lot of information in a short amount of time about your surroundings. It is difficult to present lecture type information and keep an audience. A car wreck will go much further in gathering attention than me building a set of shelves. A pretty girl building a set of shelves would work too.

Some people can just talk in to a camera and it seems interesting. I guess that is charisma. There is a group of New Yorkers who all vlog and all know each other. I bet one got recognition and the others fell in to the game. The same is happening to some out of work actors in LA. Here we go again with the U. S. being boiled down to two out of three costs.

You can definitely stop and think about what your are writing much more than when you are shooting a video. You can shoot multiple takes and edit out the blanks and brain farts, but you can hone written word more. I think that is why books are just so much better than movies in so many cases. The experience of the written word is in your imagination. The reader pulls an idea off the page and then another, building a castle in your head. With movies, it takes much greater skill to leave things to the imagination and make the story stick. Then there is Avatar. I have still not seen it. I hear that it dominates the imagination and hammers the visual world down your throat until there is nothing left. This leaves some viewers in a state of 'duhhhy' for hours if not a lifetime after the movie.  Hitchcock was a master at putting just enough on the screen to make you dream the story.

Saturday Morning Chaos

Couldn't help myself. Playing with Elle and the cats this morning I broke out the Flip. It sucks, but it was fun. Took an age to upload. I pulled this in to the editor and was looking for stuff to cut out. Then, I just didn't. I'm always terrified of leaving in something that is bad.

Truth

I have nothing to add. I cannot follow this except to say that I fear the same is happening in the U. S..

Notes:

Today is the fifth of February. My birthday comes up soon. I haven't even looked up what day of the week if falls on. Normally, up till I turned 40 at least, I would have done this some time last year. I don't care about 41 thought. It is just rolling off my back on the floor, where I'm leaving it to fend for itself.

A couple years ago every company decided they needed a web page to survive. Now they want a Facebook fan page or personality to be noticed. It is turning in to a place that tries to sell you stuff. When it becomes a place where I pay my bills, I may decide it is too much trouble to deal with. It is getting too big and too unwieldy. It was a place to keep in touch with your friends.

 It has been nearly 10 years since the Concord crash. It has finally boiled down to a bunch of law suites. Continental Airlines and a couple employees and a couple engineers and a guy who had something to do with the design of the Concord are all defendants. "Things just take a long time here [France]." I remember the video.

 While on my way to the elevator, friend of mine asked me a strange question. "Why do you smell like meat?" This took me off guard. It took me a minute to remember that my jacket still smells like smoke from Ken's birthday party several weeks ago. It is wood smoke, We didn't cook anything over the fire. Not sure why, but it does smell like cooked meat.

Notes:

There ae at least 12 words for 'bribe' used in Afghanistan. I'm trying to think how many words we have in the U. S. that mean the same thing as 'bribe'. I'm thinking of phrases like 'kick back', 'greasing the wheels', 'cross the palm [with silver]'. There must be hundreds. No single words come to mind. 'Graft' is more than bribes. 'Corruption' is just generic.

Bad Box

I had to swap out a motherboard today at work. It was not a big deal to do the work. I was able to do everything except the CPUs. I have bad luck with CPUs. I needed help making sure the heat syncs were properly mounted and that goop was properly used.

This task had me by the short hairs for some reason. I've done this kin of thing before, but this one just wore on me. It might be due to the long time It has taken to get the parts from HP and the fact that we first got a new power supply. who knows.

• Unplug all the exterior stuff.
  
• Open the box
• Start pulling things off that are in the way. This box had tons of air flow stuff that came off easily.
  
• Mark everything plugged in to the board. This box had a dozen fans all plugged in sequence.
  
• Pull the memory and any other modular crap like that. Note where everything went.
  
• Unplug everything.
• Figure out which screws need to come out. Some of those screws are probably holding a heat sync on the back of the board for the CPUs.
• Pull the heat syncs off and make sure nothing is hiding behind them.
• Mark the board as bad with a big sticker.
• Swap the CPUs. You probably want to wait for the motherboard to be screwed down before putting the heat syncs on.

Then repeat in reverse order.

There is a tone of details. It is great where I work. People are willing to help me out when I come across something that I do not feel comfortable with. That is basically putting the heat syncs back on. This is because the goop you have to use takes a bit of artistry to get it right. It needs to be thin, but consistent. I'm not good at either. Fortunately, we have folks who do that and much more complex tasks for a living.

This case is a 1 U blade server. That means it is nearly two dimensional. Fitting one thing on top of another or running wires over or under something is a real pain. This made sliding the new motherboard in to place a challenge because every loose wire wanted to scoot under the board as I was trying to herd all the rest of the wires out of the way.

It worked. Left it running the afternoon. Left it running over night. Generally, it fails in the first five minutes if it is getting hot. Wish me luck.

Setting up a work notebook

No, I do not get a notebook. I do get to set them up.

Had to call Dell on a laptop at work. The machine worked for a while and then stopped booting. The LEDs on the front of the system were blinking in a specific order. They had me re-seat the memory and in the short term, that seems to have worked. Easy Peasy. Thanks Dell. Hopefully, this is the last blog on the subject.

I nearly had to call Dell back because I couldn't figure out how to throw the switch to get the wireless activated. There is an LED that shows the activated wireless hardware. It was dim on this machine which means the wireless network is turned off.

I searched for a button. I searched for a symbol for the function system on the notebook keyboard. I finally asked Long, my roomy, to take a look because I was just plane missing it. It turns out you have to touch the LED. It is a button. It is part of flat plastic surface with a bunch of other LEDs that just screams "This is not a button."

Thanks Long.

It was all kind of a wash, because the laptop had some real problems and ended up getting sent back to Dell. We will get the same model back in like a month so I will have completely forgotten how to do it. Someone call me on it if I blog the same thing in three or four weeks. Long will probably yell at me.

Not too may problems like that from Dell for us. I would say we have had pretty good treatment of bad bits from Dell. I still feel confident recommending them to folks.

Every Angle

Remember that nut who jumped a rally car between buildings? Well, here are a bunch of POV (Point of View) angles from the car.

The quality is a bit granny. Still Cool to check out.

The one

Science: Super Strong Metal Foam Discovered on Monday February 01, @03:39PM Posted by ScuttleMonkey on Monday February 01, @03:39PM from the body-armor-in-a-can dept. class="media"> background: url(//a.fsdn.com/sd/topics/topicscience.gif); width:62px; height:75px; science background: url(//a.fsdn.com/sd/topics/topictech2.gif); width:60px; height:80px; technology ikeChino writes to tell us that a North Carolina State University researcher has discovered what appears to be the strongest metal foam yet, capable of compressing up to 80% of it's original size under load and still retain the original shape. The hope is that this amazing material could be used in cars, body armor, or even buildings to absorb the shock from earthquakes. "Metal foam is exactly what you might think – a cellular structure made from metal with tiny pockets of space inside. What makes Rabiei’s metal foam better than others is that she’s been able to make the tiny pockets of space more uniform. And that apparently is what gives it the strength as well as elasticity it needs in order to compress as much as it does without deformation. Many tests are being performed in the laboratory to determine its strength, but so far Rabiei says that the spongy material has 'a much higher strength-to-density ratio than any metal foam that has ever been reported.' Calculations also predict that in car accidents, when two pieces of her composite metal foam are inserted 'behind the bumper of a car traveling at 28 mph, the impact would feel the same to passengers as an impact traveling at only 5 mph.'" Slashdot

That little voice in my gut that has never failed me except when I do not listen to it tells me that this invention is the one that will lead to the revolution in many things like batteries and materials strong as steel and light as cotton candy. I picture one day being able to spray steel on to a room temperature mold like paint to reinforce your creation. They will build houses out of plastic chicken wire and spray foam that last a hundred years. When you are done, you melt it down and put it back in to a can for the next house.

Well, that would be nice.

Notes:

February. It was August fifteen minutes ago.

I was so busy getting video stuff done last night that I never did get my podcasts for today at work. I had to, gasp, listen to music. It was nice not having news playing in my ear. The news really is depressing and stressful. No wonder people know so little about current events.

I'm thinking of writing a python script that randomizes code indention on all projects in an SVN repository. Just to stir things up. What do you think?

Sunday Evening Music and Video

Got the text with the time and headed to PJ's. I tried to convince Nat to go. I think she would have enjoyed it. They don't turn the volume up too damn loud. You can still talk to your friends and hear the music.

I walked in the door to Lance and Justin waving me over. We chatted for a while and enjoyed a couple artists taking their turn on stage. It's funny how much talent there is out there just walking around. I want to go back and video some other folks.

When the fellas went on stage, they really looked like they were enjoying themselves. Justin has this box he uses for percussion. It works great. It is like a portable drum kit. He should take that thing to Faire. He would be a huge hit. At one point Justin uses Lance's guitar as part of the percussion. The crowd seems to like it.

I snuck up to the front and shot some video. It was fun. One of the regulars told me to move the bits of stage out of my way next time, that no one would care. It is a very friendly place. I imagine as long as i don't get between people enjoying the show, I'll be OK. I'm shocked how well the Flip recorded the sound. Not a half bad job.

The guys came off stage and looked electric. They loved performing. The crowd applauded. I have to say that I've only experienced that once or twice in my life, after plays I was in. It is addictive.

Nat was a real sweetheart and gave me rides to and from PJ's. Nat has been worried about her mother. She is not in the best health. Any spare prayers are appreciated. Elle was with Bill.

When I got home, I put the videos on the computer and started editing. It took me two tries because I thought there were three songs and figured out after my first attempt at uploading that there were four. It turns out if you change the name of a video too soon after uploading it, it blows a gasket. Lesson learned. I ended up re-uploading them this morning before work. That didn't leave me any time to post a blog entry or hit the social media sites.

Lately, I've been watching a bunch of vlogs. It seems like there are about ten good ones and thy are all in cahoots. They are all New York collage students who are friends. As a matter of fact, the vlogs are much better than Friends ever was. So, I've been aching to add some content. I got it, thanks to other's talent and hard work.

Ate after the show. I had one beer. I woke up this morning with a headache. I had acid reflux all night because I ate so late. God, I'm old. Had a ball.

Let/s try an embedded play list and find out what we get. ... Dagnabit. It is playing in reverse order. I'll figure it out eventually.