Google Earth - take a flyover

"discovered" this beta program today, though I had heard of it before.

Try a "fly over" from one major city to another. It's pretty damn cool.

Simpsons - still going strong

Arabized Simpsons?

Homer no longer drinks beer, eats bacon, donuts, or Hangs out at Moe's. I understand they need to change things for "religious" (*cough* bullshit. It shouldn't matter what you believe, don't be scared by seeing another opinion, or even laughing at it!) regions to broadcast in the Mideast, but come on. These changes undermine Homer.

Anyhoo, I was watching Simpsons the other night (the Jailbird episodes), and Dani mentioned something very "deep".

How can Simpsons go 17 seasons so far, and still going strong? Shouldn't they have ran out of material? A lot of the new episodes "suck" though, don't they? Then why are a handful of episodes of the latter seasons still "classic" type Simpsons?

A possible answer: Simpsons is moving to an almost SNL style comedy. 80% of the episodes being made are topical/new events/political type humour that there is always more of, and a handful each season are "story/plot" driven "classics" like most from seasons 1-10. This ensures they don't have to try to "stretch" the ideas they have for plot/story episodes every season to fit all 23/24 episodes. This is perfect for me: the topical humour ones are okay to watch once, and the "classic" ones from the newer seasons go into syndication (which seems to be the case already.)

This is the first I had heard of this.

Of course, another 2 other plausible reasons for the show continuing on are:
- Fox makes $$$, thus they keep it going regardless of how good/bad the new episodes are.
- The creators want to break all the milestones ;)

Or, like most things, the truth lies somewhere in between.

Kingdom of Heaven

This movie only got lukewarm reviews, probably because it was quite slow in some parts.

I thoroughly enjoyed it, however. Perhaps I'm a sucker for epics, though ;)

The major theme in the movie seems to have been "to be a good man, you help others, and make decisions that benefit the most but do no harm, irregardless of what some others might think. You are the keeper of your own soul, not others".

In this movie, and has been historically, religion has been used as a tool by leaders to motivate others to go to war. Hence, it makes perfect relation to the saying that the top reasons for war have been over land/power, and religion a very close second.

Oooh, epic battles. That reminds me, Civilization 4 comes out this week :)

The Nintendo Revolution

I've always loved Nintendo games/consoles. Gamecube is the only of this generation of consoles I've owned, and will be likely for the next generation too: I know I wont' be playing the next Zelda game on PC, but most PS2/XBOX games I can get on PC :)

How Stuff Works: How the Revolution Works

This is a bit of old new, however, here it goes:

The "Revolution" is mostly in the controller: the hardware of the console itself will be competive with XBOX 360 / PS3 (probably in the middle somewhere like this generation.)

The exciting thing is the controller. Just imagine how different it will make a game like say, Metroid Prime (the above configuation would be awesome for it, with the "nunchuck" analog stick.) You'd feel like you were Samus!

The key to Nintendo's new game interface lies inside the controller. Instead of using a joystick to control the game, the primary control is the controller itself. The controller contains solid-state accelerometers and gyroscopes that let it sense:

• Tilting and rotation up and down
• Tilting and rotation left and right
• Rotation along the main axis (as with a screwdriver)
• Acceleration up and down
• Acceleration left and right
• Acceleration toward the screen and away

Hence, you would have full 3d Position control by moving the "remote", and also tilting and screwdriver like rotation.

That's like.. 9 degrees of Freedom, or soemthing crazy like that.

How does Nintendo plan to use this "new" (none of these ideas are new, but their implementation may be) technology in games? See for yourself.


In the end though, the success of Nintendo's new console will depend on making this idea work AWESOME and be totally INCORPORATED into most of the games (this is why addons have historically never succeeded.), rather than it just remaining a gimmick. Take for instance, the Nintendo DS: most of the "touch" games make only rather gimmicky use of the new control method. Hence, the DS has had only marginal success.

Should a Christian Play Dungeons and Dragons?

Note: admittedly, a small rant follows. Ain't that what blogs are about though, eh?

/*
I really hate to post about stupidity again.. but this is too "good". Found this by accident looking for the movie, Dungeons and Dragons 2. Hope to God it's not as awful as the first, but then again, it's a made-for-TV movie.. ugh. You know, Merlin(1998) was great when I was yonger (a made for TV movie about 5-10 years back). I tried watching it again recently though and kinda cringed. Guess that means my tastes have changed a bit. Perhaps this could be explained by the nostolgia concept: we seem to see the past with rosy glasses, so to speak.


Should a Christian Play
Dungeons & Dragons?

Read for a good laugh.

My god . People still think like this. The same 50% of brainwashed Christians who voted for Bush must have wrote this dribble! AHHHH! My brain truly hurts.

This "D&D is the spawn of Satan" Prolifited propogranda is the likes of why beaurcrats (oh, I understand what beaurocratic means now), are generally hated. A bureaucrat is a politician (usually) who WANTS his MISSION to come true, irregardless of if it is totally wrong, based on information he/she knows are a lie, mainly all for personal gain . Take for instance, in the 1930's (see the history channel special, "Illegal Drugs and how they Got that Way: Marijuana") . After booze was banned for many years (smart move that was I'm sure), the idiotic bureaucrats had to tackle something else, that is in fact even less harmful the booze. The idiots "banned" WEED in the 1930's in the US for their own personal politics against Mexicans "invading" the US. Why does Canada want to legalize pot? Because contrary to some popular belief, weed has been used for mellenia as a herbal medicine, and was perfectly legal up until the 1930's when this proopgranda began, and still exists today. Canada doesn't want to keep weed illegal, because we realize the whole basis for marijuana being illegal is based on American Propoganda lies from the 1930's.

This is why history is so entertaining to read (I should watch more history channel for stuff like this!): it's fun to see how idiotic people were, and how many still are!

Don't get me wrong: Pot is "bad", like alcohol is "bad", and should be controlled for minors using it. However, the ads I still see on TV are almost as bad as Reefer Madness propoganda movies of the 30's (watch Reefer Madness (1936) or the recent remake with Neve Cambell, Reefer Madness: The Movie Musical (2005), for an idea just how bad it was back then.) These ads come up with stuff like "oh, Weed will make you insane, etc" which is totally bogus. Why not tell the truth? Like alcohol, you can become "dependent" on weed, and it can "dull" your life. Just like sex education, teaching people the truth (oh , these same "groups" still have problems with sex education) is much more valuable than making shit up (ie. all sex is bad. EVIL.)

So, in the end, the average Canadian realizes this ( I hope) and why the issue keeps on being pushed. I say GO Canada! Let's be more free-minded (I hate the term liberal or democrat or conservative or republic.. those are just BS words) like Europe and less closed minded than the US. Only pissing off the US too much is a bad thing,gotta do it in the right amounts ;)

Anyhoo, back to "D&D is evil" thing. That author of this article notes the "excellent' work of Wendell Amstutz, Steve Lansing, Ph.D., and Richard Noe for their excellent work on D&D in their masterful book, EXPOSING AND CONFRONTING SATAN AND ASSOCIATES . I see that the book, is thankfully out of print and only limited in availability.

I know you can get your PHD in utter nonsense, but a PHD in "D&D is evil" . COME ON NOW. You know, I haven't read the book , but I guarantee what this guys involvement (Steve Lansing) was. He's got a PHD in phychiatry, and spewed this twisted Christian crap as real psychiatry. Someone should inform "Dr" Lansing, that the basis of all medical and scientific fields is to leave religion out of it. Christianity and religion in general is good, but when the Bible, a game of moral stories and phone tag is taken literally, bad things happen. Look at those damn suicide bombers. In general, beuracrats and propoganda seem to be almost always bad, I think :)

End Rant
*/

Weezer and Fightin' Foo

Visited the Joe Louis arena last night with Dani, her sister and her sister's boyfriend.

Man, Weezer stole the show! I love it when a band sounds significantly better in concert than on precorded cd/radio. They even played a Foo Fighter song since Rivers (the lead singer) mentioned that the Foo Fighter's wouldn't be playing one of their older hits, "Big Me". Later on in their performance, during the traditional "pretend we are going to leave, and the audience cheers and demands for more" (Note: Do all musicians do this? :) ) , Rivers snuck up to the other side of the arena, and played "Island in the Sun" in acoustic. While he was making his way back, the other guitarist, Brian, mentioned they'd need someone from the audience to play the acoustic guitar until Rivers made his way back. The guy Chris from the audience was really great; he was rockin' up on stage with the band. The band even let him keep the acoustic guitar afterwards. :) I also particulary liked Rivers' comment of "Today in the hotel room, I wrote a new song. It's called Piece of the Pie. We can't play it for you, because you'll record it and put it on the internet. Then by the time the new album comes out, you'll all be sick of it!" :)


The Foo Fighters also rocked the arena. The band's visual techno stuff was also awesome; they had 3 gigantic tetris-puzzle piece shaped screens showing alternating clips of the band, road trips, and more surreal imagery. The "laser fan" array lights were also awesome; everything moved well in sync with the music. I especially liked their rendition of "Everlong" and "Monkey Wrench".

I gotta to go to more concerts ;)

Who's infinitely stupider then George W Bush?

OH, a difficult question to answer. Alas, I have found the answer.

Certain TV executives, and I bet the same ones who make $10M a year.

One of my favourite shows was canned - "Dead Like Me" after 2 seasons. Why? OH, the executives viewed a bar graph their secretary or co-op prepared and deduced: Not high enough ratings (at least the most important reason.) Of course, they probably didn't bother to look at the fact their sorry ass Showtime company failed to advertize it much at all.

This has happened in the past with many great games, movies, and other TV shows.

Case in point "Family Guy". Canned after 3 seasons, why? OH, the executives viewed a bar graph their secretary or co-op prepared and deduced: not high enough ratings. Those idiots didn't realize it was mainly because they couldn't decide on a damn time slot for the show over 3 years.

Perhaps I'm being too hard on business executives. On retrospect, no: I'm not being hard enough.

The "business engineering manager" at the Powerhouse I worked at was exactly like that.

Note: the longer your title, the less work you actually do , ie. producer (has to manage and procure all the stuff for the movie to be made) vs executive producer (shows the movie off and promotion, or worse, just likes to see their name on things, like that damned Tarantino.)

He'd analyze bar graphs prepared for him and say "Well, this powerhouse is losing money by running the generator. Let's get rid of it". He'd say to me, "engineering is about numbers." I didn't have the heart (or the wallet) to tell him, but he's dead wrong. You might learn mostly math in engineering, but it's not all about numbers. Numbers mean absolutely positively nothing unless you know what they mean, how the data was collected, etc. A respected engineering manager would make decisions based on raw data but also with understanding the issues surrounding it. He's been a "business manager" for too long at Ford and whatever dipshit company he worked at in Ukraine, and is no longer and engineer. The same goes for these TV execs, perhaps they onced cared about the programming, but no longer, they are just "business managers". Some people will argue " but making those tough decisions is their job", BULL-SHIT. Make those tough Correct decisions is their job. To do your job correctly, you need to be able to see farther than 5 feet ahead of you in most cases.

IF you performed a more accurate cost analysis of the powerhouse system, as I did (even though it was far from perfect, but more in depth than previous analysis), by understanding the energy transformations and such going on, and related issues (ie generator correcting power factor and voltage dip problems, etc.), he'd see that the generator wasn't losing nearly that much money, and could easily make money again next year if the price between gas and electricity differed by only a relatively small amount.

Here's an idea: How about these companies pay me $100,000 / yr to make these decisions, and not $10 M a year like these execs get. Hell, I can blindly interpret graphs and make decisions like that. "OH, draw a line. Any show below this line is canned". It simple statistics. We all know how reliable those are. Someone should tell these execs: seems they are missing out.

IEEE Spectrum Technology Tidbits from October 2005 issue

Exoskeletons, AKA Power Armor :)

Well, not quite, yet, but it's underway, and the Military is funding a lot of the research. Increasing functionality and reduces costs of robotics, which includes:
- Faster processors to allow more complex control algorithms
- Smaller, more powerful and robust electric motors.
- more advanced sensors to obtain motion and muscle reflex information from the human body.

is bringing this once science-fiction based idea closer to reality.

By "Power Armor" or exo-skeleton, it means:
- The system augments the users muscle commands.

Hence, for any control system to work, there needs to be a sensors that can pick up these muscle commands. Researchers in Japan have developed a "bio-cybernic" system that monitors electrical currents known as electormyogram, or EMG, signals in the wearer's muscles. By interpreting these signals, the motors in the robotic exo-skeleton joints can be given proportional commands to augment the human's muscle response. If the user has nerve problems, adaptive learning algorithms that store the user's walking pattern via motion sensors can also be utilized. Another alternate sensor system for exo-skeletons under development uses sophisticated force sensors at certain points, like underneath the feet or at the joints.

One such exo-skeleton let's a user pick up 84 kg without feeling barely a thing!

That's the interesting thing about control systems, especially robotics : a lot of the issues with them are closely tied to people's limitations and desires.

The first commercial application of this technology is the HAL-5, which will help elderly and disabled people walk, pictured below.








Replacing Copper Interconnects with Fibre-Optics
"Siliconizing" fibre-optics means that all the copper interconnects in microchips could be replaced with higher bandwith photonics. In fact, one of the current main limiting factors in chip design (especially high speed chips such as microprocessors) is the copper interconnects themselves.

However, the fibre-optic technology of today does not use silicon (CMOS) based technology that would make it suitable to manufacture as integrated circuits, but rather uses semiconductors such as gallium arsenide. To fully "integrate" fibre-optics onto a chip, you need to be able to make the following subcomponents with silicon using standard CMOS processes:

- an inexpensive light source.
- devices that route, split and direct light onto the silicon chip
- a modulator to encode or modulate data into the optical signal.
- a photodetector to concert the optical signal back into electrical bits.
-Low cost, high volume assembly methods
- Supporting electronics for intelligence and photonics control.

It seems, however, that much of this research into this technology is underway by Intel. Although relatively little research has went into this technoloogy over the past 20 years, it is ramping up. Metaphorically speaking, I believe Intel sees the brick wall ahead of it, speeding towards it, and must find a way to veer around it. ;)

Space Elevator

This one has been getting much attention. I sure hope it gets built. A relatively simple idea that just might work.

Pyramid Shaped Solar Collectors
Researchers at the Rensselaer Polytechnical Institute are using optical methods to focus light onto more efficient photovoltaic materials. I believe much research needs to be done in this area. Solar power could be utilized much more than it is now if the efficiency of the light to electrical power conversion could be significantly improved.

Transmitting Power with Fibre-Optics

Typically, fibre-optics have been used mainly to transmit information. However, there are numerous aerospace and military applications that would benefit from ridding of the fear of short circuits and sparks inherent in electrical power systems. For example, the prime suspect of a 1996 passenger plane crash is a spark in the central fuel tank.

Similar to the use of fibre-optics in chip interconnects, little significance has yet been placed on this. However, JDS uniphase has made a photovoltaic cell with a conversion efficiency of 50%. Typically, light to electrical transducers used in standard solar power systems are only about 15-20% efficient. This increased efficiency is possible because the lasers providing the power can operate at more efficient frequencies for this process, whereas solar power arrays must work with the frequency of radiation the sun provides.

7000-Ton Particle Accelerator with 8, 100 Ton 25 meter long superconducting magnets

Man, this European organization known as CERN loves thier proton accelerators. Pictured is one of their older models, which is humungous. The one I'm talking about was just recently built. The cost of those magnets for accelerating the protons themselves must have been like in the billions. Heck, even Dan Brown's "Angels and Demon's", a precursor to the Da Vinci Code, included CERN in it's fictional conspiracies.

Why People are so damn ignorant

Another article I read that intrigued me today involved why people are so damn ignorant.

I think it stems from our education system, or there lack of. Especially the grade/highschool education systems in much of the "southern" parts of the USA.

• History is not taught well or at all. I barely learned any in school. Perhaps had I went to a public school where 10-20% of the time wasn't spent on religion it may have been different. I read up on historical events myself quite often now a days.
• The cliche goes something like, "if we don't learn from our history, we are doomed to repeat it". Well, if the average person now a days knows essentially no history whatsoever, except for perhaps a tiny bit about their own country, what does this portend/foreshadow?
• CREATIONISM only is taught in most schools in the southern parts of the USA, and evolution is banned. Heck, I know there are a quite a few holes in evolution theory, and it's certainly not the full explanation of how life came to be, but creationism has more holes in it than swiss cheese. This type of ignorant attitude by school board systems is the really the reason, if you ask me, why the brainless lead the blind currently in the most powerful country in the world. In the least, both ideas should be taught.
• Even Ancient history should be brushed upon, or at least some history of other cultures. Perhaps if the average person in North America learned that hatred for say, different sexual orientations, is not the way it has always been, things might be different.

Utter laziness!

I was reading in the Windsor Star this morning about the newly completed pedestrian overpass for Assumption school . The city/school board spent an additional $400 K to get it completed quickly. Now students can cross the street safely without having to wait for the light to change.

Oh, so what is the student reaction presented in the paper? "Oh, we won't use it. It will take way too long to climb the steps. I can't take over 5 minutes extra for my lunch to climb those stairs."

What???

For the love of God, I can be quite lazy myself. This goes too far. It takes 5 minutes! to climb maybe 15 ft of stairs? And here I thought I was out of shape.

The funny thing is, months ago when they were first starting to build it, this was exactly the reaction Dani predicted, that the students wouldn't use it because they're too lazy. Here I gave the students of Assumption the benefit of the doubt ;) There's even talk of getting rid of the intersection entirely to force the students to use it.