Monday November 24, 2008
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Ramblings from the Mountains Michael Hunter's Weblog |
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Monday November 24, 2008 This might be the right legal decision. I'm not qualified to comment on that part.
But I think it is the kind of freedom crushing decision which the rest of this country should be quick to see reversed. Sadly it is riding on the back of our current devil so I'm sure it will be quietly accepted in the large. An article on a legal decision leading with a sentence about the defendants in the original trial is a sad statement about bias in our media. ( Nov 24 2008, 05:16:05 PM PST ) Permalink
Wednesday May 07, 2008 Ferrite Male Build bitchin' battle armor and leave the seat warmer out? R would have never made this mistake. And there would have been plenty of cup holders to boot. ( May 07 2008, 12:49:07 AM PDT ) Permalink
Tuesday January 08, 2008 I listen to a lot of music. When I was younger I would listen to music while working but over the last decade or so I've found that difficult. Attention wonders with words, thoughts, rhyme, and rhythm. Recently I've found I'm able to work to house, trance, and symphonic music. Until I discovered that my mechanisms for listening to music have been focused on either going to shows or listening to music in the car. I don't tend to listen to music when hiking as I like listening to nature. With my newly rediscovered interest in listening to music while working I was stuck with an old 20 GB Zen stuffed with music from another era in my life, a Zune I picked up sometime ago that I never really liked, and a 80 GB IPod I inherited from a relative which I'm slowly putting interesting music on. Over the past few years I have gotten really use to having Sirius satellite radio in my car. Those drives along 50, 88, 95, or 395 contain a lot of dead spots for conventional radio. Just in time along comes the Stiletto 2 Sirius portable satellite receiver. So far due to a wee bit of snow I've spent the last few days mostly inside. But one of the cool thing about the Stiletto is that it has a wifi interface that allows for easy access to the Sirius Internet feeds. Now I can work, wonder around the house, run on the treadmill, and, after changing my wireless router, shovel and snowblow to the end of my driveway while listening to whatever makes me happy at the moment. Now that I've made it sound perfect I should mention that I havn't really used it receiving from a satellite yet. I tried at one point while snow blowing at a relatives house but the trees, cloud and show cover appeared to be too much. I really don't like the power indicator. Its a simple bar style indicator. What I really want to know is how much more time I can listen. The Stiletto will recharge via its USB connection but thats slower then slow. Even if its powered off that can still take a significant portion of the day. It recharges quickly via a power plug but usb cables are so much easier to carry around. I think it also uses a fair bit of energy while on standby (paused). Maybe thats the wifi? If you look at the list of stations when receiving from the satellite you will see the current song or program. But when receiving over the Internet you don't. Thats lame. Even lamer although expected in our current RIAA slavery you can't time shift off of the Internet stream. ( Jan 08 2008, 09:20:52 PM PST ) Permalink
Friday November 17, 2006 Its been a while since the last 007 came out. As outlined here this isn't the first production of Casino Royale although the articles author's did seem to forget that it wasn't (in movie time) bond's last attachment to a woman. I saw and enjoyed the movie today. I very much enjoyed the young Bond. I thought the brash aggressive style could be made much of in coming episodes. The opening African chase scene was out of this world crazy. Nice seat on the edge building tension with a nice twist. The plot line was typical 007 although due to the need for what seemed like more setup then normal and what seemed like more time spent on the twist at the end the core story was a little rushed. I applaud the studio for not focusing on some sort of middle east terrorist plot and using less politically incisive but very relevant villians. The less then stellar parts about the movie include the title track and the technical aspects surrounding poker. Either nobody on the set understood the basic rudiments of the game or they though the audience woudn't care. I suspect I'm going to see a bunch more silly river slow rolls in the coming months. One of the best poker lines was the one that went something like "oh, and the valet ticket also". Of course 007 didn't have enough money on the table to cover the bet of the Austin Martin, but that was par for the poker course. ( Nov 17 2006, 04:48:49 PM PST ) Permalink
Tuesday October 10, 2006 dead and poker I just finished reading One Of A Kind a biography of Stuey Ungar by Nolan Dall and Peter Alson and and Phil Lesh's (bass player of the Grateful Dead) autobiography Searching For The Sound. Both books were very interesting and carried related significance to me as I first became interested in gambling after visiting LV to see the Grateful Dead. Both books were also depressing as the primary character in one and most of the characters in another were deeply effected by drugs. I think it would be easy to just say that drugs were the bogey man and that if they were somehow not available or restricted that these scenes might have played out differently. But I think in both cases the people involved, esp. Stu Ungar and Jerry Garcia, were very conflicted. I think they would have turned to other destructive behaviors in the absence of drugs. I see both books as examples of why forcing drugs into the dark corners of our world ultimately leaves us fewer options in trying to help those around us that have problems. One of the things I found most interesting about Phil's book is the constant discussion of how the on stage relationship lagged the break down of the off stage relationship. Given the primary members of the Grateful Dead had grown up together it appeared to me that the most honest form of communcation would often continue after other avenues had broken down. Even just getting the echo of what this was like was worth the depressing and expected end of the book. The Dalla/Alson book was also about somebody whose abilities had been formed very early in life. But in this case without a real form of communication with most of the rest of the world. Stuey Ungar's destructive gambling tendencies away from poker would drive him away from what he was best socialized to do creating an every ending spiral downward. The rest of the world was foreign and alien to him with his physically small figure just magnifying others preception of his immaturities. A fairly depressing two book read. I guess I'll go see a good jam band this weekend and maybe play some poker :) ( Oct 10 2006, 11:05:52 PM PDT ) Permalink
Tuesday October 25, 2005 Killer Angels I finished listening to Killer Angels a few days ago but I havn't really wanted to write much about it until now. Written a couple of decades before Gods and Generals Killer Angels deals with the events leading up to (after Fredericksburgh) the civil war battle at Gettysburg. Much like Killer Angels the focus is largely on the southern generals although there is some coverage of the decisions made by the union leading to the first major union victory. If I was reading this book it would have only been due to the capable story telling that I would have been able to finish it. Picking up a book to read which talks about such a depressing set of events on both sides would have been painful. But as an audiobook I was hooked into listening to more every time I got into the car. Much like in Gods and Generals the character development in Killer Angels was riveting. I strongly recommend this book to anybody who likes historic novels and is interested in the civil war. Just be warned that its an emotional roller coaster. ( Oct 25 2005, 05:34:31 PM PDT ) Permalink Comments [0]
Monday October 10, 2005 Gods and General's Gods and Generals is one of the best novels I've ever listened to. I've had the standard education about the Civil War together with an audio lesson about the history of the American Civil War but I don't think I ever understood the south. Ever. I assume this is partially due to the people who were teaching me and my own bias. But Jeff Shaara is able to make the characters come alive in a way that makes me really want to go back and study the war in a more comprehensive manner. This is a extremely enjoyable story. ( Oct 10 2005, 11:16:29 PM PDT ) Permalink Comments [0]
Sunday June 05, 2005 The Cluetrain Manifesto, Rick Levine, Christopher Locke, Doc Searls, David Weinberger, ISBN 0-7382-0431-5, ~190 pages. I'd poked around the website long ago when this was fresh. But I never read the book (I don't find reading online to be all that comfortable1). The basic idea of bringing humans in closer contact so that (market) conversation can be more real is interesting to me but doesn't seem all that ground breaking. Personally I think the aggressive "street" (not as in wall) style of writing doesn't enhance the message. A little bit of grittiness helps contrast the writing to that of the suit world. But the rest of it manages to obscure the real message of the book. That is really a contradiction for a book which focuses on human communication. 1I say that, but recently I've become addicted to Safari. The difference is that I use Safari for reference works and introductions that I am unlikely to read again. While I now know that The Cluetrain Manifesto fits into the second bucket it wasn't obviously so until I was partially through the book. ( Jun 05 2005, 10:53:10 PM PDT ) Permalink Comments [0] Tahoe Ice Grave, Todd Borg, ISBN 1-931296-13-8, ~288 pages. Tahoe Ice Grave is the third is the Own McKenna Mystery Thriller series. I've written about the two earlier books, Tahoe Deathfall and Tahoe Blowup, in the past. I'm somewhat embarrassed to admit that I read them out of order and didn't realize until I was into the second book. I think some of my discomfort with the earlier books character development was partially based on this confusion. In any case I recommend those books as fun reads. Tahoe Ice Grave follows in the same line as the earlier books. A mysterious death is investigated by Owen McKenna. Besides a sequence of events which happen in the Tahoe area (stretching to Virginia City) Owen also travels to Hawaii to gather evidence. And hey, Owen is still going to my favorite breakfast spot (off diet!) and happens to venture into my neighborhood! If there was anything I disliked about the storyline it was a plot device used at the end to clean up some loose ends. But that doesn't distract much from my enjoyment of the story. ( Jun 05 2005, 10:30:55 PM PDT ) Permalink Comments [0] Innovation Happens Elsewhere, Ron Goldman and Richard P. Gabriel, ISBN 1-55460-889-3, ~400 pages. I finished Innovation Happens Elsewhere last week and was waiting to post a review until I could post about some related work. But thats been delayed a bit so I thought I should heap some praise on this more then worthy book. The web presence for the book is here. In one way I've already over hyped this book. If you've been around many open source projects most of the ideas will be familiar. The really cool thing about this book is the very clear and straightforward way it presents using open source in business both for those with an understanding of the open source world and for those that might be just dipping their toe into "gift cultures". Its always hard to become the newbie again when the topic of discussion is something that has been a part of life for almost two decades (I remember plundering comp.sources.games in college). But I think the example laden, task driven, straight shooting discussion of open source and what business reasons exist for entering and what pitfalls one might encountering will help those who are still thinking they are having a flashback to the hippie commune they stumbled into one summer during their youth when they are faced with either having to integrate open source or having their customers or employees talk to them about wanting to open source a product. The chapter list is: Introduction, Innovation Happens Elsewhere, What is Open Source, Why Consider Open Source, Licenses, How To Do Open-Source Development, Going with Open Source, How To Build Momentum, What To Avoid - Known Problems and Failures, and Closing Thoughts. If the reader is familiar with open source development most of the chapters are standalone. But there are very nice nuggets of common sense spread throughout the book which would recommend a cover to cover reading for anybody. ( Jun 05 2005, 10:03:01 PM PDT ) Permalink Comments [0]
Tuesday May 10, 2005 I just finished Lawrence Lessig's The Future of Ideas. Coming days after the broadcast decision dispels some of the gloom of the final chapters of The Future of Ideas. But one of the fundamental concepts of the book is that the old will resist the new and often the old has more political power then the new. With more neocons (but not conservatives) headed for the courts the books repeated message should be heeded by all who think the freedom to innovate is important to our economy and way of life. So thats all nice and activist in tenor. But what about the book. I think many of the concepts in the book are excellent. The explanation of the end to end concept and how it applies to the Internet and contrasting it with the phone network is very clear. Pushing forward and building a 3 layer model (physical, code, and content) of the 'net gives a model for talking about how data flows in our current world which is probably comprehensible by the non-techie. I strongly suggest the book to anybody interested in the control of IP in all of its various flavors. Many of the ideas, cases, and ad hoc examples provide fodder for continued battle with the "old" content community and with our lawmakers. The downside to the book is that it seems repetitive. Many of the cases and examples travel similar ground over and over. I suspect most who have been involved in the software trade during the last decade would feel that way. But thats the price for developing a book that can be given to somebody who doesn't have the same depth of knowledge and wants to understand why napster isn't all the evil they have heard it was or that P2P isn't some sort of new drug that is killing the nations youth. Additionally the legal slant which abstracts away much of the technical haze makes for a clearer look at how various technologies should effect our countries policies. ( May 10 2005, 07:13:12 PM PDT ) Permalink Comments [0]
Saturday April 23, 2005 Adam Curry: The starter podcast I've been listening to podcasts lately mostly on my laptop. I use rubypodder to keep a set of podcasts updated. I thought I might review of few of the podcasts I've heard lately in this section of my blog. The "starter" podcast is from Adam Curry: the ex MTV VJ, media maven, and podcast father. Adam produces a podcast named the Daily Source Code. Adam talks a lot about podcasting, the rig he uses for producing podcasts, and software he is building to make producing podcasts easier. Sometimes he will take "sound scene" tours of flight lessons or other parts of his life. Other times he talks about the music industry. In addition to his own podcast Adam regularly runs promos from other podcasts and highlights podcasts he has found interesting. One of the bigger problems with podcasts is that they don't contain section information. So in a 45 minute podcast Adam might segue between 3 different issues. If you are only interested in the 3rd topic you have to use fairly imprecise fast forwarding to find the interesting topic. Other podcasts which are more focused don't face this same problem. While I suspect most podcasts in the future will be very focused Adam's podcast serves as an important center for the podcasting community. I suspect I will always download the Daily Source Code eventhough I often skip podcasts that start off uninteresting. ( Apr 23 2005, 10:13:52 PM PDT ) Permalink Comments [0] I finished this book last night after the local poker game broke early. This is the second in a series of mystery books by Todd Borg. The first was Tahoe Blowup. I didn't enjoy Tahoe Deathfall as much as I enjoyed the earlier book. The main character (a detective named Owen McKenna) was developed reasonable well as is his girlfriend but the rest of the characters are harder to get close to. They are either very strange or keep developing well into the epilog. While this is a murder mystery some of the plot devices are a little unbelievable. Owen is an ex-policeman from San Francisco turned private investigator in Lake Tahoe. But multiple times he commits felonys for what looks like dubious ROI to me. Other plot devices are equally hard to believe although I won't detail them as to not destroy the storyline. One or two of these eyebrow raisers would make for good plot devices but they came too thick to make this book as enjoyable as the first one. Still, its centered around Tahoe and I have a hard time not enjoying the references to places I have breakfast or places I hike. ( Apr 23 2005, 11:12:20 AM PDT ) Permalink Comments [0]
Thursday November 18, 2004 Hearing the battle on the high seas As a child I spent time sailing with my father. He is a very avid sailor interested in many aspects of sailing from boat building to sailing fiction. One of the first sailing books I remember reading was Chichester's book about solo circumnavigating the globe. But sailing fiction hasn't ever really turned me on until I took my Father to see Master and Commander. I'd always been vaguely aware of the O'Brien books. They took up a shelf on my Father's bookcase. But they hadn't ever really interested me. After seeing Master and Commander I decided to attempt to read them. I got the first book and started to read it but finding time to read fiction has always been a problem for me. About the same time I had discovered audible books and given the time I spend driving to and from the Bay Area the Aubrey/Maturin series fit right in. But audible books are expensive and after a short time I realized this was a series I wanted to own. The amount of detail is such that I'm sure I will listen to them again. Enter Audible Books. Audible have a subscription offer where, for a flat fee, you can download 2 books per month. This turns out to be roughtly 30% of what I pay for the same books over the counter. After some initial issues with their download and CD burn software1 I have the process of purchasing two books every month and then burning them onto CD as needed down to a fairly efficient process. So now I am an Aubrey/Maturien addict. Its hard to go anywhere in the car without tuneing into their latest adventure. On my most recent trip to the Bay Area I listed to the 13th book in the series, The Thirteen Gun Salute. One of the things which suprised me from the beginning was the amount of autonomy the British naval commanders had. In this book Aubrey makes decisions which effect both matters of politics and war. At the end of the book the ship Aubrey has for this mission has run aground in the South China sea and he is stuck on an island with his crew. I can't wait for the next installment of this story! 1They have a fairly complicated process where you purchase the book, it shows up in your online library, and then you download it (several audio fidelities are offered although I'v only used the best as neither bandwidth nor storage are really an issue for audio) using their software. After that you can download it to a mobile device (something I havn't done yet) or burn it on a CD. This all seems complicated as they could just offer a set of formats to download but I suspect the obfuscation makes it easier for them to make it seem as if they books are not easy to copy. ( Nov 18 2004, 02:55:36 PM PST ) Permalink Comments [2]
Monday November 08, 2004 Small Stakes Hold'em by Miller, Sklansky, and Malmuth1 is a book aimed at helping beat small stakes Hold'em games. At the beginning of this book David Sklansky explains that the explosion of poker driven by TV has created new opportunities in small stakes games on the net and in the traditional casinos. As is true with most of the 2+2 books with David's name on the cover this book contains some very good advice. It suffers, as do many of the other 2+2 books, from the authors lack of ability to write very well. In their Advanced Hold'em book they comment that this shouldn't be an issue as they are experts in their field. They miss that this creates a loss of information at the communication boundary. Many good poker players like this as it keeps what is very good information out of the masses hands, but unfortunately it reduces the value of 2+2s books. Small Stateks Hold'em is written a little bit better then some of the other 2+2 efforts but still falls down heavily in its lack of organization. At the top level the organziation is reasonable progressing through the hand from beginning to end and then picking up misc. topics, an example hand section (structured as quizes), and a Q&A section spread over 7 numbered chapters. But within each of these sections there is significant information which isn't organized very well. The book is laid out as almost a set of independent essays without numbering or references2 between each which makes it harder then necessary to link information between the sections. This is very detrimental to the reader as one of the core parts of learning poker is learning how to take actions and ideas from various parts of the hand and put them together in a coordinated fashion. Most decisions in poker are coupled with other decisions. Having said that I still think that this book is important for the vast majority of poker players to read. The ideas contained within this book could be built up from a good understanding of poker (via David Sklansky's Theory of Poker probably). But collecting them together in a series of essays under a little bit of structure helps the journeyman poker player make good and immediate use of the information. This provides a bridge between knowing the rules and having sat down and played a few hands, having read Lee Jones or a similar book, and reading David Sklansky's Advanced HE book or doing some of your own research. 1Small Stakes Hold'em: winning Big with Expert Play, Two Plus Two Publishing, 2004, Ed Miller, David Sklansky, Mason Malmuth, ISBN: 1-880685-32-9. 2There is an index which is helpful for finding information by page number. ( Nov 08 2004, 05:53:53 PM PST ) Permalink |
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