“ In modern Western society, aesthetics are used in the production of advertising with massive and overwhelming success. Images that convey luxury, success and opulence dominate media – and suggest that through the acquisition of the featured product or service the consumer will enjoy a coveted lifestyle.
What is aesthetics?
The Pocket Moleskine
Earnings Before Interest and Taxation of Apple and it’s biggest competitors in the mobile space before and after the introduction of the iPhone.
“Android does not offer more than a lifeline. It is not a foundation for long-term profitability as it presumes the profits accrue to the network and possibly to Google. Profit evaporation out of devices to Google may be a possibility at some time in the future, but only if the devices don’t need too much attention to remain competitive. But because they’re still not good enough (and they won’t be for years to come), it’s certain that attention to detail is what will be most important to stay abreast of Apple.”
Tommy Lee Jones - Implied facepalm
“ Apple doesn’t often sue over patent rights, instead using them as a defense mechanism against lawsuits from companies like Nokia. But Apple uncharacteristically sued HTC over its Android phone innovations. Apple usually out-innovates its competition to the point where patents become meaningless, but having no other recourse but to sue HTC is a huge sign of weakness on its part.
http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2010/10/19/why-does-android-have-steve-jobs-rattled/
Where's the Orchestra?
A trailer music composer shares his thoughts and sheet music.
The horrible Euro truth starts to dawn on Europe's leaders
In a speech this morning, EU President Herman Van Rompuy (poet, and writer of Japanese and Latin verse) is admitting that the gamble of launching a premature and dysfunctional currency without a central treasury, or debt union, or economic government, to back it up – and before the economies, legal systems, wage bargaining practices, productivity growth, and interest rate sensitivity, of North and South Europe had come anywhere near sustainable convergence – may now backfire horribly.
Microsoft Xbox Kinect's bill of materials roughly $56, teardown finds
A listing of the major parts found by UBM TechInsights within Kinect:
- PrimeSense PS1080-A2 - PS1080 SoC image sensor processor (works with CMOS image sensor and an IR light source)
- Marvell 88AP1-BJD2 – Possible Marvell camera interface controller
- Elpida E5116AJBG-6E-E - 70nm DDR2 SDRAM (SI#18324)
- (2) Marvell G39 00A1P
- H1025519 XBOX1001 X851716-006 GEPP – Serial EEPROM for Marvell Controller
- Fairchild Semiconductor FDS8984 - N-Channel PowerTrench MOSFET
- NEC uPD720114 - USB 2.0 hub controller
- (2) Wolfson Microelectronics WM8737G - Stereo ADC with microphone preamp (one for every two microphones)
- STMicroelectronics 25P16V6G - M25P16 - 16 Mbit, low voltage, Serial Flash memory with 50 MHz SPI bus interface
- STMicroelectronics H28A 9017
- WT245 – Texas Instruments SN74AVC4T245RGYR - 4-bit noninverting dual-supply bus transceiver
- Texas Instruments 70530-08T-AVF4 – TPS3705-30 - Processor Supervisory Circuits with Power-Fail
- Texas Instruments TAS1020B - universal serial bus (USB) peripheral interface device
- Kionix KXSD9 – 3-axis accelerometer
- (2) Analog Devices AD8694 - Quad, Low Cost, Low Noise, CMOS Rail-to-Rail Output Operational Amplifier
- TI ADS7830I - 8-Bit, 8-Channel Sampling A/D Converter with I2C Interface
- Allegro Microsystems A3906 - Low Voltage Stepper and Single/Dual DC Motor Driver
- STMicroelectronics M29W800DB - 8 Mbit (1Mb x8 or 512Kb x16) NV Flash Memory
Basics of the Unix Philosophy
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Rule of Modularity: Write simple parts connected by clean interfaces.
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Rule of Composition: Design programs to be connected to other programs.
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Rule of Separation: Separate policy from mechanism; separate interfaces from engines.
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Rule of Simplicity: Design for simplicity; add complexity only where you must.
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Rule of Transparency: Design for visibility to make inspection and debugging easier.
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Rule of Robustness: Robustness is the child of transparency and simplicity.
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Rule of Representation: Fold knowledge into data so program logic can be stupid and robust.
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Rule of Least Surprise: In interface design, always do the least surprising thing.
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Rule of Silence: When a program has nothing surprising to say, it should say nothing.
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Rule of Repair: When you must fail, fail noisily and as soon as possible.
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Rule of Economy: Programmer time is expensive; conserve it in preference to machine time.
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Rule of Generation: Avoid hand-hacking; write programs to write programs when you can.
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Rule of Optimization: Prototype before polishing. Get it working before you optimize it.
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Rule of Extensibility: Design for the future, because it will be here sooner than you think.
Procrastination, or why you have so many movies on your Netflix Instant Queue
If you have Netflix, especially if you stream it to your TV, you tend to gradually accumulate a cache of hundreds of films you think you’ll watch one day. This is a bigger deal than you think.
Take a look at your queue. Why are there so damn many documentaries and dramatic epics collecting virtual dust in there? By now you could draw the cover art to “Dead Man Walking” from memory. Why do you keep passing over it?
Psychologists actually know the answer to this question, to why you keep adding movies you will never watch to your growing collection of future rentals, and its the same reason you believe you will eventually do what’s best for yourself in all the other parts of your life, but rarely do.
Infographic: What are dividends?
Artistic Style - C Code Beautifier
A Free, Fast and Small Automatic Formatter for C, C++, C#, and Java Source Code. Runs on Windows!
Mark Horowitz: the SoC future is a chip generator
The message that Mark is sending to the chip and SoC design houses is that the designs they are putting together are most likely not the optimal solutions for what applications the customers have in mind. Instead, he would prefer if these companies instead of trying to guess what the customers want should rather put their efforts into developing a chip generator that would allow the eventual consumer to configure the final SoC as needed. Want half the cache: no problem - want to eliminate some not needed IOs: no sweat - need to configure your memory differently to optimize the performance, or add some extra math processing: no sweat. Essentially, let the customer figure out what they need, and you just focus on developing a tool that will put it together for them. I have to admit Mark, this does sound fantastic indeed. As a matter of fact, it is something that occurred to me a while ago while working on several SoCs that were very similar, but not similar enough for some of our customers, and thus required separate design spins. The problem is that while the chip generator might be more feasible than a silicon compiler, it is still something immensely difficult to pull off.
Is It Time To Review Reviews?
No matter how much we might disagree with them, reviews are important. They tell us about games, they give opinions on how good they are compared to others, and help us work out what to spend our money on.
Back in the old days, magazine reviews were pretty much all we had to go on, hanging off every word of the 4 or 5 articles about a game.
But now, the internet means that there are so many reviews, reviewers and review sites, that “review aggregating” sites such as Metacritic or Gamasutra are needed in order to get an overall opinion.
The problem is that they do the complete opposite they don’t give an overall opinion, instead they provide weight to the haters and hide actual reviewers opinions in a mask of homogeneity.
The solution – a new form of aggregation formula, similar to that used by Rotten Tomatoes for movies.
