strip for August 7, 2009
August 13, 2009
File under: rise of the “app store” meme. Seen on Slashdot:
‘Robotics is at the stage where personal computing was about 30 years ago,’ says Chad Jenkins of Brown University. ‘But at some point we have to come together to use the same resources.’ This desire has its roots in frustration, says Brian Gerkey of the robotics research firm Willow Garage. If someone is studying object recognition, they want to design better object-recognition algorithms, not write code to control the robot’s wheels. “You know that those things have been done before, probably better,” says Gerkey, who hopes to one day see a robot “app store” where a person could download a program for their robot and have it work as easily as an iPhone app.
Seen on Slashdot. I thought this event was a little disappointing — Charles Stross is capable of much more fascinating ideas.
Peripatetic Entrepreneur writes “At the Science Fiction World Convention in Montreal, Hugo Award winning author Charlie Stross and Nobel Prize winning economist Paul Krugman opened the show with a 75-minute, wide-ranging conversation on stage. From flying cars to decoding the genome of the Pacific Ocean to vat-grown Long Pig, it’s all there. Audio is also available — video soon.”
Source. Jen, are you responsible for this?
Young Asian guy, telling stripper what he does for a living: Do you even know what a hedge fund is?
–Strip Club, Queens
Seen on Planet Debian. Source. File under “all hardware sucks, all software sucks”:
Via Dave Jones, an excellent article on a professional musician switching to Ubuntu from a Mac.
Seen on Planet Debian. Source:
When I started my job, I decided to get an Apple Laptop because I wanted to try something new. I installed Linux (which is not so smooth to do on Apple). It was to put bluntly, a mistake.I really dislike the hardware and keyboard and it is just, like so much Apple hardware, flimsy. My CD/DVD player is already busted (and it is too much effort being in PR to fix it right now) and I feel like I have to treat the machine as a fragile one. I have heard so many Apple owners say “my hardware crashed, I sent my machine to be fixed” and when I point out that it messed up, many respod “but they have a great warranty.” The best warranty is not having to use the warranty.
Busy that night, but other people might be interested. Source:
So when I like something, I tend to REALLY LIKE it. One of my great likes is the Brooklyn-based performance group What We Know So Far. They focus on Internety/geeky/memey things and give a really entertaining and clever show. In just 2 days, New Yorkers will have the chance to see Not One, Not Two, But Three of their performance pieces at the Third Ward.
Edit: Actually the next thing is October 9th, that sounds pretty doable!
Seen on Planet Debian. The article:
I’ve been taking a closer look at the WebOS side of my Palm Pre tonight, and I noticed that it periodically uploads information to Palm, Inc.
Seen on LWN: Is free the new pay?
Watching the “X is the new Y” meme jump the shark. What does it mean for free to be the new pay? Does saying it provide or convey any information? Is it analogous to saying “free has displaced pay”?
