Tuesday, 14 September 2010

Just a note

The only bad thing about being on Waiheke is the internet coverage. I have not been able to get online long enough to post to the blog for eg - most days. So I guess there is a very long post coming up.

I get my internet at $3/hr through the internet cafe in Oneroa, which is OK. The library has a captive node which seems to only works with IE, so they are going to Hear From Me quite soon ;) I'd have thought that Waiheke at least would be more open to, well, Openness - but there is a lot of ignorance here. Still, SFD coming up!

In the news that is not about sport or natural disasters I see that Gartner, usually such a good MS mouthpeice, is predicting an Android takeover of smartphones. All ceterus paribus of course. I see they have omitted to mention that Android is a distribution of Linux, but you will see that the strengths listed in the link are the typical Open Source strengths: developer-friendliness. The author makes a mistake counting the "Apps" though, in a free software environment you will get fewer add-ons because everyone is free to modify an existing work while a small change to a proprietary app needs a whole new program to be written (or royalties payed). Still, the dominoes are falling. The linux comunity has been jumping up and down about linux on mobile devices for ages now.

On a personal note - I have been experimenting with spacecraft again - look, shiney:
fdl initial shading


In sport and natural disaster news:

You think NZers are sports mad? Consider, those miners trapped down a hole in Chile ... what is their special request? Right behind "get us outta here" they wanted a set of shirts signed by their soccer team. Personally I'd have other things on my mind like the smokers (second hand anyone) and the diet (beans).

At home, while Cantabrians lament their destroyed property, there are scientists also examining the effects and saying things like "this is so cool". But quietly, because even scientists have some tact. This is just too good-an oppportunity to see close-up how chunks of the Earth actually work. It also tells you a lot about the scientific frame of mind, if you are the sort to witness Natures destructive power and think "wow I can really learn a lot here" then you are a scientist.

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