Aaron and I thought we could take a different tact in getting back at bad motorists.
Author Archives: Danny Silverman
London Photos!
!=http://farm1.static.flickr.com/167/380014243_a1279fd287_m.jpg(Great Clock of Westminster)!
Remember back in May when I had the pleasure and good fortune of visiting Europe with my Aunt Linda? A while back I posted some pictures from Scotland, and now here is the follow-up with some interesting bits from London along with pithy commentary. Click on the photo to the left or the title above, start with the first picture (with the soldiers), and follow along on my adventures! Paris photos will appear sometime in the future.
“Using municipal Wi-Fi for residential coverage [is] the equivalent of expecting street lamps to light everyone’s homes,” says the founder of a mesh network startup in the _NYTimes_. I’m glad someone is finally saying it, and someone is finally listening. I still believe that, at least in America, the best current solution is fiber to the building. Once it gets there, dense wireless such as 802.11-based mesh networks are an effective and inexpensive way to distribute in multi-unit dwellings. But muni wifi with current technology is a major waste of taxpayer money.
The living room portion of the housing evolution
A chronicle of the transformation of the condo I bought to the condo I want to live in.
Ars explains the technology behind the Super Bowl broadcast. Having not watched much football in a while I was particularily intrigued recently by the virtual first down line and the overhead “cablecam” shots that are used in modern football broadcasts. This article explains how they work.
Letter to Mayor Menino
It is important that the mayor reassure citizens about the capability of Boston to efficiently respond to real emergencies. Recent statements indicting Turner Broadcasting and local artists for their part in a guerilla marketing campaign gone awry do little to ease our fears.
In this “Post 9/11 World,” as the Mayor puts it, it is important that we know authorities are trained and prepared to respond appropriately and proportionally to potential terrorist threats. That the city was shut down yesterday by a marketing gimmick that had been in place for 2-3 weeks speaks more to problems with local disaster preparedness and emergency management than it does to the any miscalculation on the part of Turner Broadcasting.
I am heartened to hear that police called to the scene of a hospital where one of the devices was found chose wisely not to evacuate the area — a highly disruptive act — based on a cool-headed assessment of the situation at the scene and the determination that the potential threat posted to patients and workers was minimal. But that such restraint could have been exercised elsewhere in the city where small circuit boards with some flashing lights were found, we wouldn’t have a $500,000 police bill to contend with.
If a terrorist wanted to blow up a bridge, or a T stop, or a hospital, there are far more inconspicuous and devastating ways to do it than to use flashing lights and D-cell batteries. A bomb in a cardboard box or garbage bag or a motor vehicle would be disastrous, yet we do not live in fear of every lumpy trash bag or ugly Vespa be see around the city. If we did, we would not be able to live our lives at all.
The last thing we, as a neurotic and on-edge society need is fear-mongering by our public officials. In this Post 9/11 World, to once again resort to hyperbole, the terrorists have truly won when we can’t go about our lives without an irrational paranoia of little magnetic signs with wires sticking out. Mr. Menino, please grow up. Please react rationally. Please don’t get caught up in the ridiculousness of this situation — use it as an opportunity to re-evaluate city response and tactics, not to prosecute hapless bystanders who happened to participate in one of the many “guerilla marketing” campaigns to which this city has been subject in recent years.
A cool, measured, and introspective response is what would best serve your citizens. Yelling will do no good to anyone, except, perhaps, the terrorists themselves, who see their handiwork of five years ago in New York continuing to pay dividends across American each and every day.
Good book
I did that thing where you start reading something and you can’t stop until you finish it six hours later. And by the way, the last five pages or so of _The Prestige_ can be counted as among the scariest things I’ve ever read before bedtime.
Is SciFi pulling a Firefly?
I watched the premiere of the new SciFi show _The Dresden Files_ last Sunday and thought it was fairly awful. Then I learn (from Wikipedia among others) that what I was watching was actually episode 3, and the two hour pilot has been condensed to one hour and shifted to episode 5. Now I don’t know if the pilot is any good, but I generally like to start watching a show by being introduced to the characters, environment, and, ya know, central conceits of the show (i.e. I’m a detective, but I’m also a wizard, and here are some of the things I can do and some of the limitations, and here is what “being a wizard” means in this universe). The new “first” episode didn’t really establish much of anything, and so didn’t hook me, and so SciFi (and the show) lost a viewer. Sucks, cause for all I know it might actually be a good show. Or not.
Wondering what life is like at McMurdo Station in Antarctica? For an in-depth look, tons of residents are blogging. For a tourist’s eye view (in 9 easily digestable journal entries), check out MSNBC reporter Miguel Llanos’s reflections from time on “the Ice”. Don’t miss the audio and picture slideshow. Link is to the oldest entry, click “previous” to move forward in time.
Brrr
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Frankenstein says George W. Bush hasn’t been a “disappointment” of a president, rather he’s done everything we expected him to do! I can see his report card now: “met expectations.”
When this entry about the design of the Disneyland entrance area mentioned having to wait in five seperate lines before getting into the park, I could name them all, as that was exactly my experience when I went over Christmas. Ridiculous. Especially the useless bag check.
Life on Mars returns
Sam Tyler finds himself transported to the 70s (or perhaps stuck in a coma) in BBC hit _Life on Mars_.
Rumour has it [ _sic._ — they’re Brits] that the excellent 70s cop drama _Life on Mars_ will begin transmitting its second and final series sometime next month. I’ve dropped _Studio 60_ like a rotten watermelon to make some room in my schedule for my favorite British time-travel cop drama. I have mixed feelings about the Beeb’s decision to keep the show to a two season run (for a total of 16 episodes). I’m happy that they’re willing to try interesting new things, see them through to a logical conclusion, and not keep them on well past the expiry date. And I understand that the particular gimmick used in this show just can’t go on and on forever without resolution. But I’m sad because the show is so well done and I’m sure there are more good stories that could be told if the show were to stick around for another season. Plus 16 episodes isn’t even one full American season! (In fairness they *are* full hour episodes, rather than the 40-45 minute shows we air here).
On a related note, does the BBC understand that, given the opportunity, I would gladly pay the full UK television license fee if it meant I could download all of their television content from bbc.co.uk? I’m sure I’m not alone.
_The Brandeis Hoot_, my favorite campus newspaper, is still going strong on its two year anniversary. Their most recent editorial reflects on the confidence boost the visit of President Jimmy Carter has brought to campus. The sentiment is good, and the last two lines are very much a trademark Danny Silverman editorial ending, which makes me proud. 🙂
My boss’s boss’s counterpart over at Stanford writes in _Wired_ about how courts are doing a very bad job of limiting the scope of computer searches. My laptop was purchased by Harvard, but I’ve got my entire life on it, and according to some recent rulings government agents have the right to search it without cause at any time. And instead of the standard limits placed on warrants which specify the scope of the search and the evidence being collected, with laptops often the entire hard drive can be trolled for anything potentially incriminating, even if it is well outside the scope of the original investigation.
_NYT Magazine_ has an amusing profile of the only Socialist Senator, Bernie Sanders of the great state of Vermont. He’s an interesting guy, to say the least. Only in Vermont?
Thought process
I’ve been hearing good things about this show _My Name is Earl_, maybe I should buy the first season DVDs. Before I do I want to make sure I’ll like it.
I know! I’ll buy the pilot episode on iTunes.
Oh, the pilot episode isn’t on iTunes. Guess I’ll just download the whole thing from BitTorrent.
Review
Scrubs: My Musical
Yesterday Scrubs aired their 123rd episode, titled “My Musical” and revolving around a woman with a mysterious illness that causes her to hear everything in song. You may recall that Buffy did an ingenious musical episode during their sixth season that brought up a lot of important character development and conflict that would otherwise have been difficult to portray on screen. Scrubs, which often looks to Buffy for inspiration, isn’t quite as able to do that (in part because of the nature of the show, in part because of the half hour format), but that doesn’t make the musical any less fun to watch.
‘Children of Men,’ Alfonso Cuarón’s vision of an infertile, war-torn future, is a grim masterpiece.
Cory Doctorow: “Today, Disney’s Tomorrowlands are poised on the horns of a dilemma: a random blend of live stages, Jules Verne steampunk, Fantastic Plastic 60s swirls, advertising-supported exhibits from three CESes ago, defunct race-bikes, and a diorama of the 1964 Progress City where the voice-over once welcomed ‘Our most welcome neighbor: Our GE nuclear power-plant!’ If earlier Tomorrowlands showed our enthusiasm for the future, and then our sense that it had arrived, now Tomorowland shows our deep ambivalence, salted with nostalgia, confusion and cynicism.”