Category: Technology

  • So far, yet so short…

    two days into my smart phone experience, i am simultaneously amazed and disgusted by the state of technology surrounding these devices and ‘cloud’ applications. back in the day, i had a ‘hacker’ mindset. i found flaws in systems that let me circumvent security or gain privileges not intended for users (or remote people not intended…

  • windows is beyond a joke (or, why we’ll all be using macs soon)

    Mom has been limping along on a 7 year old computer that tries to run XP. Unfortunately, Dad loaded MS One LiveCare on it and didn’t realize that they could do the internetz w/o the MSN software from the ISP. This comp is a dog, so miserably slow I would literally throw it in the…

  • Microsoft LifeCam – sucks the life out of me

    It wasn’t my choice, but I was handed a Microsoft “LifeCam” today, as the original recipient didn’t want it. Figured I’d try to use it to make a Guinea Pig cam after seeing a nice setup and live streaming a few nights ago. The software it comes with makes me want to vomit. Insert the…

  • Opera upgrade woes

    I use the Opera web browser for doing work on OSVDB. It started when I used 6.02 and it was a screaming fast browser and lasted for years. At some point the site became more feature rich and the ancient version didn’t cut it. I bit the bullet and upgraded to Opera 9 which had…

  • Over Reliance on Social Network Friends in Zynga Games

    Re-thinking Game Design for Character Advancement Abstract:Zynga is a commercial company that produces free games that are played via the Facebook social network. Per Zynga’s mission, they seek to “connect people through games”. This is readily apparent in their eagerness for you to play games with your friends through a number of game designs and…

  • Hypersensitive Computer Displays

    I’ve noticed this many times over the last decade. computerized display systems are often hypersensitive to the point of being silly and absurd. Years ago I noticed downloading files via some clients would show me the speed of the transfer to the Nth place, where N is totally ridiculous. I was getting 83.92384293842903k download and…

  • BumpTop 3D and Computer Interfaces: The Real Hurdle

    I’m a fan of videos showing advanced in computer interaction. The BumpTop 3D model is definitely neat, and the fundamental technology behind it is no doubt revolutionary. I say this sincerely because i recognize the functionality it offers and the difficulty in converting such ideas into graphic output, and more to the point, I take…

  • Stupid E-mail Disclaimers and the Stupid Users that Use Them

    [This was written with Martums and originally published on attrition.org.] We thought it would be a fad. Ok, we hoped it would be a fad, destined to go away as quickly as it came. Unfortunately, those worthless e-mail legal disclaimers still pollute the internet. Written by overzealous lawyers that don’t seem to realize the stupidity futility of their effort,…

  • Building a Better Windows

    Disclaimer: This is written based on the use of Windows 95, with little to no exposure to Windows98 or Windows2000. The original publication date is not known beyond 2000. It started out with my pager blurting a number in the XXX area code. The phone number did not look familiar at all, and the area…

  • How Netscape Is Begging Me To Convert

    This was originally published on Demonic.com. The exact date of publication is unknown other than 2000. I am a diehard loyalist when it comes to software. No doubt some might consider me a bit fanatical in defending my choices in certain operating systems, browsers and other utilities. As a result of this stubbornness, it is…