August 1, 2004 - Rockfish
Agenda
Restore from Backup
George saw a link to a great lecture on DRM (that's "Digital Rights Management") given by Cory Doctorow to Microsoft's Research Group on June 17, 2004.
Doctorow was talking about what a bad idea DRM is. Here's an excerpt:
Cory tells some great anecdotes which support his points, and gives us a history lesson in protecting information and intellectual property. Read it!.Greetings fellow pirates! Arrrrr! Here's what I'm here to convince you of: 1. That DRM systems don't work 2. That DRM systems are bad for society 3. That DRM systems are bad for business 4. That DRM systems are bad for artists 5. That DRM is a bad business-move for MSFT
George felt that Cory's style of speaking was similar to the writings of Neal Stephenson, and I agreed. It turns out that Cory is also a relatively new science fiction author, so George and I both bought his first novel: Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom.
Down and Out takes place a hundred years from now in a future where resources are plentiful, and death has been conquered via an interesting means. People live forever by always keeping a recent, complete backup of the contents of their brain, and restoring from that backup into a newly-grown clone as needed (like when old age approaches, or when one dies from a horrible accident, or even when one wants to erase a recent and particularly painful period from their life).
Julius (the main character) has fulfilled his dream of actually living in the Magic Kingdom of Disney World. He works in a cooperative that maintains the various attractions (specifically, he cares for the Haunted Mansion). But changes are afoot... a new group has a plan to completely re-engineer the Hall of Presidents, challenging the status quo and the very way of life for the traditionalists who control the park.
|
"He sparkles! He fizzes! He does backflips and breaks the furniture! Science fiction needs Cory Doctorow." --Bruce Sterling, author of Distraction. |
I enjoyed the novel, especially some of the ideas about the future, but found the protagonist (Julius) to be a very frustrating character to follow around. He felt sorry for himself most of the time, treated the people most important to him very badly, and made very poor choices.
George and I were discussing whether the method used to achieve immortality was, in fact, living forever. If you die and a copy of your memories is loaded into a clone of your body, it certainly is you from everyone else's standpoint, but the "you" that was "retired" is clearly dead and gone. Of course, the new you continues on, adding their memories to the ones you stored, but they are still a carbon copy.
Cory Doctorow has made Down and Out, and his second novel Eastern Standard Tribe, available for free download. Both books have been published under a special license which not allows and even encourages people to copy and distribute the works.
Lunch With George is hosting simple text versions of the two novels:
Cory also hosts many different formats at his site, ranging from PDF to various Palm reader formats. You can get Down and Out in these various formats here, and downloads of Eastern Standard Tribe are there.
Cory Doctorow is also a contributor to a group weblog called Boing Boing, a "directory of wonderful things". It is definitely worth a visit! I read Boing Boing nearly every day.
Cheap Monitor
Ever since I sold my Powerbook and my 17" Apple flat panel display and have working solely witth a 12-inch iBook G4, I've really missed having the option of sitting at my desk with a nice big display in front of me. Sure, I can (and do) plug in a keyboard and mouse, but that 12-inch display on the iBook is tiny.
I'm not willing to spend a lot of money on a monitor right now for a couple of reasons: My iBook won't drive a digital display (like an Apple Studio), and it only will drive an external monitor at 1024x768. Do you get the idea that Apple wants power users to buy those pricey Powerbooks?
So... I have been monitoring the Fry's Electronics specials for months, and they finally had a Hyundai 17-inch CRT for only $69 (I told you I was cheap!). I marched into Fry's ready to carry out my low-cost prize, only to discover the monitor was aa TOTAL PIECE OF CRAP. I know... what did I expect for $69?
They had nothing else around $100 that looked decent, and neither did Best Buy, Circuit City, or CompUSA, unless I was willing to mail in a $50 rebate card. No rebates for me-- I hate 'em!
I gave up and drove to my Dad's house to take him out to dinner. As I drove North on 44th street, I passed Costco. COSTCO! They might have a monitor! I parked, flashed my membership card, and strode directly to the electronics aisles. There it was! A 17-inch Envision monitor, with a perfectly flat CRT and a price tag of $108.00. Needless to say, it now sits on my desk in the offfice at home, where I can use it for either my iBook or for the clunky 8-pound Dell P.O.C. that they make me use at work.
The moral of this story: Don't forget Costco!
Element Test Drive
 |
| Honda CR-V |
 |
| Honda Element |
I've been worrying about all the miles I have on my 2001 Honda CR-V (100,000), not to mention the increasing repair bills. So, I decided to look at a new vehicle. Any car I might buy needs to hold me and my kids, all of my stuff (and theirs), get good gas mileage, be reliable, and not too expensive. My final candidate list had only two vehicles: The Honda Element and the Honda CR-V.
I went and test drove the Element, one of my favorite cars. What a disappointment! It seemed clumsy and lurchy-- I felt like I was driving an old (although tiny) school bus! I tried to like it, but it just wasn't happening. These cars are for someone, but not me.
 |
| Subaru WRX STi |
 |
| Mitsubishi Lancer EVO |
I bought the 2004 CR-V. The new model is bigger than my old one, more powerful, rides more smoothly, and had 9 miles on the odometer when I took delivery. It'll do.
George was remembering his test drive (I guess I should say test ride) with Bob Bondurant in a Corvette Z06 (we talked about this back on May 25th). Even though he felt as though the Z06 must be the fastest production car in America, he was recently told there are two others which can beat it: The Subaru WRX STi and the Mitsubishi Lancer EVO.
Both of these cars claim Horsepower nearing 300, and both turn in some impressive performance: The STi was the speed winner, logging 0-60 in 4.9 seconds, while the EVO trailed at 5.3 seconds (the Corvette Z06 is clocked at around 4.6 seconds). The best part: They both sell for around $30,000!
Here's a great article comparing them: Splitting Hairs at Sport Compact Car Magazine.
Scamming the Scammer
I found a very funny link at the J-Walk Blog about a guy who scammed a scammer. Read it here. Basically, a scammer offered to but this guy's Apple Powerbook (which he was listing on ebay) through an escrow service website that he made up. The seller was onto him, and set up an elaborate scheme (with the help of the readers of his blog) that is quite fun to read about. The picture above is the notebook computer they ended up shipping to the scammer!
Commuting
George is now commuting to work on his bike, but needs a way to carry all his stuff... especially his ThinkPad. He tried wearing a backpack with a laptop sleeve, but in the 100-plus degree weather, that became pretty uncomfortable.
He did some searching and came up with the "Carradice Nelson Longflap" saddlebag, and the SQR uplift.
George had found a cycling website that recommended the Longflap for carrying a laptop, and it even showed the best way to use it. Unfortunately, that site only exists in the Wayback machine archive. He bought both the Longflap and the Uplift at Wallingford Bike Parts. Said George: "They were great! I ordered the bag Sunday evening, got an email the next day saying it had been shipped FedEx 2-day, and got it on Tuesday. Shipping charge was $8."
