http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/ Adam Wiggins - LiveJournal.com Wed, 19 Nov 2008 23:36:54 GMT LiveJournal / LiveJournal.com adamwiggins personal http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/46375.html Wed, 19 Nov 2008 23:36:54 GMT http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/46375.html Daylight saving day apparently occurred about two weeks ago. For the first time in my life, I didn't notice.<br /><br />The reason? All of my clocks are now smart; they know their timezone and the date, so they know when to display daylight saving-shifted times. (This in addition to keeping themselves synced to atomic clocks via the internet and <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network_Time_Protocol">NTP</a>.) I have two smart clocks: one on my computer, and one on my phone. I'm very rarely more than 5 feet away from at least one of these.<br /><br />I've removed all dumb clocks from my life. First, I don't have any standalone clocks. Next, I don't set the time on my microwave clock, leaving it showing "0" when not cooking. And finally, I put a piece of electrical tape over the digital clock in my car's stereo, so that its time display is not visible.<br /><br />For the record: daylight saving time is stupid, and <a href="http://www.standardtime.com/">should be abolished</a>. It already has been in <a href="http://phoenix.about.com/cs/weather/qt/timezone.htm">some places</a>. But until it is gone worldwide, smart clocks are a good workaround.<br /><p><font size="-1"><a href="http://dusk.org/adam/?p=223">View this post or comment on my blog</a></font></p> http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/46375.html public http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/46263.html Sat, 15 Nov 2008 21:55:49 GMT http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/46263.html <blockquote>"People who possess loads of information in a particular field have historically been in hot demand and able the charge high fees for access to their stuffed, fact-filled brains. This was because the facts used to be difficult to access. Not any more. In an era where information about seemingly anything is only a mouse click away, just possessing information alone is hardly the differentiator it used to be. What is more important today than ever before is the ability to synthesize the facts and give them context and perspective."</blockquote><br /><br />From <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Presentation-Zen-Simple-Design-Delivery/dp/0321525655">Presentation Zen</a> by Garr Reynolds<br /><br /><p><font size="-1"><a href="http://dusk.org/adam/?p=222">View this post or comment on my blog</a></font></p> http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/46263.html public http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/45909.html Fri, 14 Nov 2008 10:16:27 GMT http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/45909.html <blockquote>"Q. Have your billions made you happy? <br /><br />A. I’m reasonably happy, but the money’s not the point. It’s an indication that I’ve succeeded in the grand adventure of understanding reality."</blockquote><br /><br />- <a href="http://money.cnn.com/2008/05/12/pf/soros_interview.moneymag/">George Soros</a> <a href="http://sivers.org/grand-pursuit">(via Derek Sivers)</a><br /><br /><p><font size="-1"><a href="http://dusk.org/adam/?p=221">View this post or comment on my blog</a></font></p> http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/45909.html public http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/45738.html Fri, 31 Oct 2008 21:11:31 GMT http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/45738.html Today I opened a new book (Clay Shirky's Here Comes Everybody) and was shocked when the fifth physical page (not by page numbers, but by actual pages I had to turn after opening the cover) proclaimed: Chapter 1.<br /><br />What, no preface? No introduction? No acknowledgements? (Without the acknowledgements, I'll have no way of knowing that this book wouldn't have been possible without the efforts of many great people!) No preface to the second edition, or notes from the author, or a table of contents that spans a thumb's-thickness worth of pages?<br /><br />Yes, amazingly: this book Got Right To It. I wish we'd skip all the build-up rigmarole, and get right to it, a bit more often. Not only books, but everything. Like DVDs with their FBI warning, Interpol warning, intro to the menu, menu transitions, and questions about whether I want to play with commentary on or off. Or software and websites with splash screens. Or video games with long intros. (Special props to <a href="http://braid-game.com/">Braid</a> for dropping you into the gameplay approximately 100ms after launching the game.)<br /><br />Let's get right to it, shall we?<br /><br /><p><font size="-1"><a href="http://dusk.org/adam/?p=220">View this post or comment on my blog</a></font></p> http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/45738.html public http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/45397.html Thu, 30 Oct 2008 05:13:07 GMT http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/45397.html Having traveled to five different cities in three countries this summer, the one that stands out is Bordeaux, France. This city is beautiful, even moreso than Paris. Every building seems to be of 15th century construction, with detailed stone facades, wrought-iron scrollwork on the balconies, and huge banded wooden doors worthy of a Lord of the Rings movie. The narrow streets somehow feel intimate instead of claustrophobic; perhaps this is because most of the traffic is pedestrians. And the city's relatively small size (same population as San Francisco, but spread out over more space) makes it feel a bit more relaxed than the usual pressure-cooker of dense urban streets.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/quimbahi/2953257003/" title="Place de la Bourse, la Nuit. Bordeaux. by Quim Bahí, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3062/2953257003_6bafc37975.jpg" width="500" height="334" alt="Place de la Bourse, la Nuit. Bordeaux." /></a><br /><a name="cutid1"></a><br />But my favorite bit was the riverfront at dusk. The layout of the city bears a striking familiarity to Burning Man: a concave esplanade facing a wide open area (in Bordeaux's case, a river). This layout makes it possible to take in the whole cityfront at a glance, even without any advantage of elevation. Bordeaux abounds with monuments: sprawling palaces, gothic cathedrals, narrow towers topped with statues, freestanding stone arches. All of these are lit up and visible along the river esplanade at dusk. Combine the pedestrian and bike traffic, the warm weather, bits of music drifting in from various open-air stages, and the background chatter of people enjoying the evening, and the whole effect is very pleasant.<br /><br />(If you find yourself visiting Bordeaux, you should definitely stay at <a href="http://www.ecolodgedeschartrons.com/">Ecolodge des Chartrons</a>. This B&#038;B has the nicest accommodations of anyplace I've ever stayed, and an amazing location right next to the waterfront.)<br /><br /><p><font size="-1"><a href="http://dusk.org/adam/?p=219">View this post or comment on my blog</a></font></p> http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/45397.html public http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/45310.html Fri, 17 Oct 2008 08:00:05 GMT http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/45310.html <blockquote>"Permeable membranes, that's the key: a constant exchange between outside and in. You've got to let the world leak in, and let yourself flow out into the nutrient bath around you. [..] Life is all about having a permeable self - not so you're unclear who you are, but so you overlap a little with the others on the edges."</blockquote><br /><br />From <a href="http://www.sfsite.com/fsf/toc0809.htm">Arkfall</a> by Carolyn Ives Gilman<br /><br /><p><font size="-1"><a href="http://dusk.org/adam/?p=218">View this post or comment on my blog</a></font></p> http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/45310.html public http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/44879.html Wed, 17 Sep 2008 08:43:26 GMT http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/44879.html <a href="http://www.variantfrequencies.com/2008/07/10/the-destruction-of-sennacherib/">The Destruction of Sennacherib</a> is a short story on the Variant Frequencies podcast. I found its overall production striking: use of sounds, music (some of which I recognized as <a href="http://www.abneypark.com/">Abney Park</a>), and multiple voices combine to produce a fiction podcast episode not quite like anything I've heard before. Good stuff.<br /><br />Sidebar: this story is steampunk to the gills. A year ago <a href="http://dusk.org/adam/?p=142">I called steampunk "a rising genre."</a> Aparently I underestimated that by quite a bit, since the <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/08/fashion/08PUNK.html?_r=1&amp;oref=slogin">New York Times</a> is writing about it now.<br /><br /><p><font size="-1"><a href="http://dusk.org/adam/?p=217">View this post or comment on my blog</a></font></p> http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/44879.html public http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/44606.html Mon, 15 Sep 2008 06:15:11 GMT http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/44606.html Eric Raymond goes no-holds-barred on what he calls <a href="http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=371">identity politics</a>:<br /><br /><blockquote>"My identity is not the accidents that have happened to me. It is what I choose. What I make of myself. It is irrelevant that I have palsy; it would be equally irrelevant if I were gay.<br /><br />Identity politics, whether it’s about the “identity” of being palsied, or gay, or white, or black, or anything else, is a symptom of deep failure at choosing for yourself, at becoming a fully individuated and fully functioning human being."</blockquote><br /><br /><p><font size="-1"><a href="http://dusk.org/adam/?p=216">View this post or comment on my blog</a></font></p> http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/44606.html public http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/44413.html Sat, 13 Sep 2008 22:31:33 GMT http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/44413.html My latest method for goofing off on the internet: <a href="http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/zero-punctuation">Zero Punctation</a>. All the epsiodes are good, but <a href="http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/editorials/zeropunctuation/2694-Zero-Punctuation-Assassin-s-Creed">the review of Assassin's Creed</a> is a good place to start.<br /><br />The recently posted <a href="http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/zero-punctuation/203-Braid">review of Braid</a> captures what's wrong with the game industry (high development costs stifling the innovation and creativity that typically comes from small dev teams), and how Braid is part of the <a href="http://dusk.org/adam/?p=178">new wave of indie games</a> which is changing that.<br /><br />For reference, past goof-off methods include: <a href="http://www.theonion.com/content/news/chrysler_halts_production_of">the Onion</a> (oh so long ago), <a href="http://www.homestarrunner.com/interview.html">Homestar Runner</a>, <a href="http://askaninja.com/node/57">Ask a Ninja</a>, <a href="http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2004/11/03/">Penny Arcade</a>, and <a href="http://xkcd.com/231/">XKCD</a>.<br /><br /><p><font size="-1"><a href="http://dusk.org/adam/?p=215">View this post or comment on my blog</a></font></p> http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/44413.html public http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/44217.html Wed, 10 Sep 2008 02:03:28 GMT http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/44217.html What will life be like in 2008? <a href="http://blog.modernmechanix.com/2008/03/24/what-will-life-be-like-in-the-year-2008/">An article from 1968</a> makes a slew of predictions. I'm impressed:<br /><br /><blockquote>"The single most important item in 2008 households is the computer. These electronic brains govern everything from meal preparation and waking up the household to assembling shopping lists and keeping track of the bank balance. [...]<br /><br />Computers also handle travel reservations, relay telephone messages, keep track of birthdays and anniversaries, compute taxes and even figure the monthly bills for electricity, water, telephone and other utilities. Not every family has its private computer. Many families reserve time on a city or regional computer to serve their needs."</blockquote><br /><br />Damn, it was doing so well right up until the last two sentences.<br /><p><font size="-1"><a href="http://dusk.org/adam/?p=214">View this post or comment on my blog</a></font></p> http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/44217.html public http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/43784.html Sat, 06 Sep 2008 23:46:16 GMT http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/43784.html While traveling through France this summer, I had the opportunity to brush up on my French-speaking skills. One of my travel companions, who was also in the process of learning the language, commented that French is a more formal language than American English. The distinction isn't visible in textbook French vs. textbook English. Rather, it can be observed in the way that the native speakers structure their everyday conversation.<br /><br />French has fewer idioms and less slang. There is generally one way to express any particular phrase, and that way will be used in all situations. For example, I often heard the phrase "Regardez ici" (re-gard-ay ee-see) while traveling. I heard it from tour guides (who were addressing an audience of strangers in a relatively formal setting), from friends addressing each other in conversation, and from little kids calling for their parent's attention.<br /><br />Literally translated, this means "Look here." Although that phrase would be perfectly valid American English, most of us rarely would speak that way, especially among friends. We'd use something more idiomatic, like "Check this out" or "Take a peek at this" or "Didja see this thing?" A foreigner with a very limited grasp of the language would be completely lost trying to follow these phrases. So while "look here" is more practical from a comprehension standpoint, but if you used it, native speakers would think your speech sounded stilted.<br /><br /><p><font size="-1"><a href="http://dusk.org/adam/?p=213">View this post or comment on my blog</a></font></p> http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/43784.html public http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/43735.html Thu, 04 Sep 2008 07:28:49 GMT http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/43735.html An unusal tale of <a href="http://blog.red-bean.com/sussman/?p=60">institutionalized sexism</a>.<br /><br /><p><font size="-1"><a href="http://dusk.org/adam/?p=212">View this post or comment on my blog</a></font></p> http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/43735.html public http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/43395.html Sat, 30 Aug 2008 19:04:43 GMT http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/43395.html <blockquote>"When I read a novel that I really like, I feel as if I am in direct, personal communication with the author. I feel as if the author and I are on the same wavelength mentally, that we have a lot in common with each other, and that we could have an interesting conversation, or even a friendship, if the circumstances permitted it. When the novel comes to an end, I feel a certain letdown, a loss of contact. It is natural to want to recapture that feeling by reading other works by the same author, or by corresponding with him/her directly.<br /><br />[...]<br /><br />A novel represents years of hard work distilled into a few hundred pages, with all (or at least most) of the bad ideas cut out and thrown away, and the good ideas polished and refined as much as possible. Interacting with an author in person is nothing like reading his novels. Just about everyone who gets an opportunity to meet with an author in person ends up feeling mildly let down, and in some cases, grievously disappointed."</blockquote><br /><br />From <a href="http://www.nealstephenson.com/content/author_bad.htm">Why I am a Bad Correspondent</a> by Neal Stephenson<br /><br /><p><font size="-1"><a href="http://dusk.org/adam/?p=211">View this post or comment on my blog</a></font></p> http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/43395.html public http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/43047.html Tue, 26 Aug 2008 06:09:36 GMT http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/43047.html Saw <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vicky_Cristina_Barcelona">Vicky Cristina Barcelona</a> the other night, and really enjoyed it. As for the polyamory themes it contains, Lauren Wissot <a href="http://blog.spout.com/2008/08/20/neurotic-libertine-vicky-cristina-barcelona-and-polyamory/">sums it up nicely</a>:<br /><br /><blockquote>"Not only is [Woody Allen's] latest celluloid psychotherapy session Vicky Cristina Barcelona a phenomenal work of intellectual porn, but it also happens to contain one of the sexiest, most hysterical and poignant portrayals of polyamory to come along in a long, long time. Allen actually gets that those of us who choose to live outside of hetero monogamy are not voracious sex addicts lacking in morality – on the contrary, we simply abide by a different set of desires and ethics than that of the mainstream."</blockquote><br /><br />Some heartwarming stills:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.nydailynews.com/lifestyle/2008/08/14/2008-08-14_like_the_love_triangle_in_vicky_cristina-3.html"><img src="http://dusk.org/adam/images/vicky-cristina-barcelona1.jpg" style="border: 1px solid #666" /></a><br /><br /><a href="http://blog.spout.com/2008/08/14/vicky-cristina-barcelona-in-defense-of-late-woody-allen/"><img src="http://dusk.org/adam/images/vicky-cristina-barcelona2.jpg" style="border: 1px solid #666" /></a><br /><br /><p><font size="-1"><a href="http://dusk.org/adam/?p=210">View this post or comment on my blog</a></font></p> http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/43047.html public http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/42938.html Sat, 23 Aug 2008 23:31:05 GMT http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/42938.html <blockquote>"My creative beast is restless and hungry, and I’ve learned that if I starve it by arbitrarily limiting its routine, it’s not happy. It’s all well and good to cut the fat out of your life to make time for what’s important, but you can take it too far. By turning off the internet, I turned off my source of inspiration. I was trying to write in a vacuum.</blockquote><br /><br />From <a href="http://www.43folders.com/2008/08/15/cooking-creative-beast">Cooking for the Creative Beast</a> by Matt Wood<br /><br /><p><font size="-1"><a href="http://dusk.org/adam/?p=209">View this post or comment on my blog</a></font></p> http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/42938.html public http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/42746.html Fri, 22 Aug 2008 02:56:44 GMT http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/42746.html <a href="http://www.brassgoggles.co.uk/bg-forum/index.php?topic=106.0">Steampunk chat abbreviations</a>. My favorites:<br /><br /><table> <tr><td>-_Q</td><td>Monocle.</td></tr> <tr><td>-O=O-</td><td>Goggles.</td></tr> <tr><td>BTC</td><td>By the cogs!</td></tr> <tr><td>WATT</td><td>What's all this then?</td></tr> </table><br /><br />I'm totally going to slip "By the cogs!" in my next conversation.<br /><br /><p><font size="-1"><a href="http://dusk.org/adam/?p=208">View this post or comment on my blog</a></font></p> http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/42746.html public http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/42455.html Sun, 10 Aug 2008 04:29:01 GMT http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/42455.html <blockquote>"There is also the question of competitive advantage. Most nations gain their advantage by making things more efficiently, and at lower cost, than their competitors.<br /><br />To the extent that the French enjoy a natural advantage, it is in their inefficiency: They are the world's most efficient producers of structured indolence. They are the kept women of the global economy; their status depends, in part, on their practical uselessness."</blockquote><br /><br />Having just gotten back from a week in France, I can wholeheartedly confirm this. The quote is from the extremely enteratining <a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601039&amp;sid=azEdlWcgsj5M&amp;refer=columnist_lewis">Sarkozy Forces the French to Join the 1980s</a> by Michael Lewis (by way of <a href="http://meganmcardle.theatlantic.com/archives/2008/08/vive_la_difference_1.php">Megan McArdle</a>).<br /><p><font size="-1"><a href="http://dusk.org/adam/?p=207">View this post or comment on my blog</a></font></p> http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/42455.html public http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/42188.html Fri, 08 Aug 2008 20:47:24 GMT http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/42188.html Plagiarism is a serious accusation. We're taught this from an early age - copying an encyclopedia entry for your report on Zimbabwe, for example, is about as grave a crime as a 3rd grader can commit. Cultural episodes like the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milli_Vanilli">Milli Vanilli</a> scandal reinforce this at an adult level: that using some part of someone else's creative work in your own is so vile an act that it might drive someone to suicide.<br /><br />But like many seemingly black-and-white moral issues, advances in technology reveal gray areas. An age of highly fluid and editable media has produced the phenomenon of <a href="http://mirrors.creativecommons.org/radio/">the creative remix</a>. Where is the line drawn between creative remixing and plagiarism?<br /><br />Is <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=muP9eH2p2PI">Weezer's video</a>, which is mostly made up of footage from various YouTube videos, a creative remix or plagiarism? How about all those <a href="http://googlemapsmania.blogspot.com/">Google Maps mashups</a>, most of which get all their content from Google Maps? What about a DJ, who usually plays nearly 100% music written by other people?<br /><br />One of <a href="http://dusk.org/adam/?p=198">my recent posts</a> was <a href="http://thecompleteaccounting.com/health-savings-account/health-savings-accounts.html" rel="nofollow">copied in its entirety</a> and reposted to what appears to be some sort of accounting-oriented linkspam site. They do provide a link back to the original article, though my name appears nowhere on the page. Is this plagiarism? By most conventional definitions, I'd say yes.<br /><br />But I'm not upset. My personal feeling is that plagiarism is not the big deal that most people make out of it. I've had my creative material copied without being asked my permission or being given attribution on the resulting work a few times in the past, usually music. For some reason it just doesn't bother me. If anything, I feel flattered that they find my work worthy of copying.<br /><br />But, there is always a moment of disorientation and slight discomfort when I stumble across it. It's like looking at a distorted image that looks strangely familiar, and moments later realizing that it is your own face being reflected back from a funhouse mirror. I can see how some, in that moment, might escalate that feeling into hurt, betrayal, and anger.<br /><br /><p><font size="-1"><a href="http://dusk.org/adam/?p=206">View this post or comment on my blog</a></font></p> http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/42188.html public http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/41958.html Fri, 08 Aug 2008 20:19:25 GMT http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/41958.html Some other perspectives on <a href="http://dusk.org/adam/?p=73">stuff</a>.<br /><br />Merlinn Man <a href="http://www.43folders.com/2008/02/19/more-peter-walsh-clutter">tackles the topic</a>:<br /><br /><blockquote>"Ours is a culture based on the idea that whenever you run out of space, you should just pull up stakes and move five miles west. <i>Then</i> you can be happy. Is it any wonder that we seek <b>organization</b> rather than <b>deletion</b> as the solution to an overwhelming problem?"</blockquote><br /><br />Three cheers for deletion.<br /><br />Paul Graham <a href="http://www.paulgraham.com/stuff.html">weighs in</a>:<br /><br /><blockquote>"Humans constantly scan their environment to build a mental model of what's around them. And the harder a scene is to parse, the less energy you have left for conscious thoughts. A cluttered room is literally exhausting."</blockquote><br /><br />Three cheers for minimalist decor - and closets and drawers, for hiding away the clutter.<br /><br /><p><font size="-1"><a href="http://dusk.org/adam/?p=205">View this post or comment on my blog</a></font></p> http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/41958.html public http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/41575.html Wed, 23 Jul 2008 01:35:40 GMT http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/41575.html Still get phonebooks delivered to your house? Wondering what to do with them? One possible use: <a href="http://www.chipsquips.com/?p=1117">"Place under your monitor to raise it to the correct viewing angle when searching for phone numbers online."</a><br /><br /><p><font size="-1"><a href="http://dusk.org/adam/?p=204">View this post or comment on my blog</a></font></p> http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/41575.html public http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/41337.html Tue, 08 Jul 2008 08:06:09 GMT http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/41337.html My favorite new word: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exonumia">exonumia</a>. Now I just need to figure out a way to slip it into casual conversation.<br /><br /><p><font size="-1"><a href="http://dusk.org/adam/?p=203">View this post or comment on my blog</a></font></p> http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/41337.html public http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/41063.html Sun, 06 Jul 2008 09:42:58 GMT http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/41063.html <blockquote>"From basketball tickets to waterfowl-hunting rights to classic albums, once someone owns something, he places a higher value on it than he did when he acquired it - an observation first called “the endowment effect”. [...]<br /><br />The endowment effect has been seen in hundreds of experiments, the most famous of which found that students were surprisingly reluctant to trade a coffee mug they had been given for a bar of chocolate, even though they did not prefer coffee mugs to chocolate when given a straight choice between the two."</blockquote><br /><br />From <a href="http://www.economist.com/science/displayStory.cfm?source=hptextfeature&amp;story_id=11579107">It's mine, I tell you</a><br /><br /><p><font size="-1"><a href="http://dusk.org/adam/?p=202">View this post or comment on my blog</a></font></p> http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/41063.html public http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/40765.html Fri, 04 Jul 2008 20:42:53 GMT http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/40765.html Mismatched expectations are the source of all drama.<br /><br /><p><font size="-1"><a href="http://dusk.org/adam/?p=201">View this post or comment on my blog</a></font></p> http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/40765.html public http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/40614.html Wed, 25 Jun 2008 03:25:30 GMT http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/40614.html All humans share a basic yearning: <a href="http://www.43things.com/things/view/1794775/meet-people-who-care-about-the-same-things-i-do">to connect with other people who care about the same things that they do</a>.<br /><br />Perhaps this, more than any other factor, explains the rapid adoption of the internet. It's a channel for people with unusual interests - interests too diffuse in the general population for them to find each other in fixed geographic area - to meet and congregate.<br /><br />Or as Megan McArdle more bluntly puts it: <a href="http://meganmcardle.theatlantic.com/archives/2008/06/mr_warhol_im_ready_for_my_clos.php">"The internet is the Freak Liberation Front."</a><br /><p><font size="-1"><a href="http://dusk.org/adam/?p=200">View this post or comment on my blog</a></font></p> http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/40614.html public http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/40290.html Sat, 21 Jun 2008 22:28:28 GMT http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/40290.html Pluto is now classified as neither a planet or an asteroid, but rather a class of object in between the two: a <a href="http://www.wordspy.com/words/plutoid.asp">plutoid</a>.<br /><a name="cutid1"></a><br />The debate over Pluto's categorization is a reminder that labels are assigned as a way for us to divide the known world into meaningful chunks; but where we draw the line between one chunk and the next is always a question of judgement. What's the difference between a fist-sized rock orbiting the sun, and the planet Earth? Just a matter of degree. They are both space debris that has been captured into the orbit of a larger body. But we find it useful to apply the label "planet" to one and not to the other, because the difference in size is a necessary precursor to other notable traits, like having enough gravity to retain an atmosphere and thereby harbor life.<br /><br />When we look at the neatly drawn diagrams of the solar system showing the planetary orbits, or play with one of those mechanical models of the same, it's easy to feel like the solar system is made up of discrete and well-defined units. In fact, it's a big cloud of rocks ranging in size from tiny grains of sand up to Jovian monstrosities that are all orbiting the sun, each other, and the galactic core in a dance too complex for us to ever fully track.<br /><br /><p><font size="-1"><a href="http://dusk.org/adam/?p=199">View this post or comment on my blog</a></font></p> http://adamwiggins.livejournal.com/40290.html public