Tag Archives: internet

Jan 22 2009
Technology

Late to the party

So.

I only really started watching and listening to Hulu and Pandora recently.  I think I got burned out during the early years when nothing was really working and they hadn’t figured out the whole “who is going to pay for this” part of the serving media equation.

I’m glad, that at least in Hulu’s case, that they’ve got it worked out.

And I don’t even mind the commercials, that’s saying a lot.  I just watched a couple episodes of “Legend of the Seeker” which is based on the Sword of Truth series from Terry Goodkind.  While I can’t recommend it wholeheartedly, it has some good moments.  Not sure if I’ll continue watching,  but at least, it’s free, available, and accessible.

I don’t have to worry about carrying that media with me on an external hard drive, and I can watch it whenever I want, on my schedule.  The latter is something I demand of my media, being able to watch at leisure, instead of being locked to a broadcast schedule.

I think that was my main issue with broadcast television.  Now that that’s over and done with, go ahead and play commercials every now and again.  No, really, it’s cool.

I’ll be sitting right here paying rapt attention to whatever it is you’re trying to sell me.

Yep.  Definitely not doing anything in another tab and just listening for when the show starts again.

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Sep 16 2008
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Update on Internet

Speakeasy was incredibly nice and credited me for three weeks of service.

They didn’t even tell me they were going to do this, they just applied it to my account for this month.  I didn’t even realize it until I looked at the invoices on a whim.

Awesome.

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Aug 13 2008
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"Well, there's your problem."

I’m in the telephone room of my condo building.  Located in an unlit hallway, I have no idea where it is in relation to my building because I can’t see the sky from the one single window into the room.  It’s lit by two bare compact fluorescent bulbs that illuminate . There is a mass of wire that flows into the room and separates into individual wires that spread out and flow into a main junction box.  They’re like the roots of some grand, vast technological tree growing above us, taking sustenance from the graffiti adorned grey metal box.

The air is thick, and stale.  The one intake fan into the room has been covered with a black plastic bag, and duct taped shut.

I have come here, to this forbidden place, this dark, grungy, forgotten room, because for the last three weeks, I have been without DSL.

To put it another way, I have had no internet connection for three weeks. Continue reading →

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Jul 31 2008
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Week 3

This is the third week of “living” sans internet connectivity at my place.

Sure, I can connect at work, but ever since the home link was severed, I can feel myself growing ever more distant from coremind.

So I think about doing something, then realize I need an internet connection to do it.

It’s rather maddening.

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Oct 17 2007
Technology

Boy, I sure do love whitewashing this fence!

I’m kind of hooked on Google Image Labeler. I know it’s work that computers cannot do. I know it’s work. I know that despite their best efforts to not be evil, google is exploiting the citizens of the internet as cheap labor. I know that it’s a clever, trickster god method for google to get human beings to label their images for their search engine.

I know all this, and I keep playing it.

How does it work? First, you are matched up with an anonymous partner. Then, you are both shown the same image. You are shown a list of words that are “off limits” if any. For instance an obvious picture of a woman may not allow “woman” as the label, forcing you to recognize the person or get more creative.

You have two minutes to get through as many pictures together as you can. You get points for matching labels, with more points being awarded for labels outside the norm, although I don’t know how they actually judge them. At the end of two minutes, you are shown your partner’s responses, and the sources for the pictures.

I have tried to figure out why this is so compelling. Is it the multiplayer with an anonymous stranger? Is it because it is a “game” that taps the shared unconscious? Is it the opportunity to flex the vocabulary that has languished while I bend aetheric energies to my will? Is it the opportunity to be really snarky with photographs?

There are probably many reasons. But whenever I’m playing it, I feel as if our shared (internet) cultural currency becomes manifest in our responses.

If there is one thing I’ve learned is that I don’t know Josh Brolin from Josh Groban, nor do I know my Hiltons as well as most people do. As a rule, I am horrible with celebrities.

If there is one thing that could be done to improve the “game,” (fingerquotes!) it would be to increase the resolution of the pictures. Sometimes, it’s just too difficult to recognize a screenshot of Ninja Gaiden Sigma when it’s shrunk down to 120 pixels in width.

Also, I think I just played the game with internet presence Cory Doctorow. It may or may not have been him (you can display whatever nickname you want), but I got a kick out of reading the responses. I really should have tagged that one pro wrestling picture with “thinly veiled homosexuality.”

That match would have been awesome.

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