Skype: Connecting Robots With Robot Grandparents Since 2009

When Katie was 2 months old, I marveled on this site at Skype's video conferencing software, software allowed us to stay in close visual touch with relatives thousands of miles away.

I'm happy to report that now, as Katie is about 2½ years old, Skype's video conferencing abilities have expanded beyond what they were in 2007. If you look in the bottom left corner of the laptop screen, you'll notice a robot (one wearing a diaper box and a bowl as a "robot hat"). Yep, Skype circa 2009 allows robots to connect with robot grandparents across the miles.

Can A Blog Win a Pulitzer Prize?

Like many of you, I suspect, I've been glued to every possible source of coverage of the current unrest in Iran (perhaps more so....sick days haven't been the same since the invention of the internets). I've looked at bunch of sites, but no single site has impressed me more than Andrew Sullivan's. Like many people, I think that Twitter is, with the possible exception of Facebook's new you-take-a-quiz-I-tell-everyone-what-friggin'-80s-pop-icon-you-are, just about the worst invention in the history of human speech.

But in the past few days, Twitter feeds have provided amazing insights into what's happening on the ground in Iran. The central government has shut down many of the major news outlets, websites, and cell phone networks, but through VPN connections and other tricks I don't understand, tiny Tweets have made their way across the world and are being used to coordinate everything from protests to denial of service attacks.

Sullivan has been compiling many of these Twitter feeds on his blog with the result that we here in the US can feel the full strength of the fear, the anger, and, yes, the hope in Iran in a way I've simply never experienced with any form of media before. Go read it.

Katie Discovers a Windows Feature — dıןɟ uǝǝɹɔs

While we were banging our hands on the keyboard, watching a web video of a piano virtuoso playing Flight of the Bumblebee, Katie unintentionally discovered a Windows feature that all should know.

If you are using a Windows machine, hit the following key combination:

Ctrl + Alt + Down Arrow

---

ʍoɹɹɐ dn + ʇןɐ + ןɹʇɔ

:uoıʇɐuıqɯoɔ ʎǝʞ sıɥʇ ʇıɥ 'pıp ʇsnɾ noʎ ʇɐɥʍ opun oʇ

Armed with this knowledge, my unsuspecting coworkers will soon know my upside down terror! Mwahahahaha!

Update (6/11): Unfortunately, it appears that the availability of the screen flip feature appears to depend on the video driver for your particular Windows system. Although the feature worked on my old Dell Latitude D610, it does not work on our systems at work. Curses!

Gadget Girl's Self-Portraiture

Katie was born into a wired world, and I find her ability to interact with gadgets a little dazzling.

Whereas I was probably fumbling with a rotary telephone dial when I was her age back in 1978, Katie knows how to turn on an iPhone, pressing the button at the bottom of the device and then sliding the virtual slider that appears on the screen. She can scroll through the application trays on the device, flicking her finger laterally until she finds the bubble wrap application or Brian Eno's Bloom application, or some other program she likes.

She's also something of a photo buff. A few months back, she learned that a digital camera displays the captured image on an LCD screen on the back. Now she says "See dat. See dat." in a patient monotone after you've taken her picture, kindly requesting to stare at the small version of herself on the camera's back.

We hit a new gadget milestone this weekend, when she obtained our friend's camera and proceeded to turn the camera towards herself, saying "cheese!" and taking her own portrait:

Less porn? No, just really bad statistics.

Reuters is running a story, Porn passed over as Web users become social, based on book by and interview with Bill Tancer, general manager of global research at Hitwise, an Internet tracking company. Obviously, I had to read the piece (I get Reuters for the porn) to see if this shocking revelation could possibly be true.

Thankfully, my worldview remained intact—porn isn't going anywhere. The relevant part of the article:

Tancer . . . said one of the major shifts in Internet use in the past decade had been the fall off in interest in pornography or adult entertainment sites.

He said surfing for porn had dropped to about 10 percent of searches from 20 percent a decade ago, and the hottest Internet searches now are for social networking sites.

"As social networking traffic has increased, visits to porn sites have decreased," said Tancer, indicated that the 18-24 year old age group particularly was searching less for porn.

"My theory is that young users spend so much time on social networks that they don't have time to look at adult sites."

I haven't taken stats in at least twelve years, but I'm pretty sure I've spotted a hole in Mr. Tancer's theory.

According to comScore, one of the more reputable Internet-use tracking firms, who started tracking search in 2003 (which makes me suspicious of claims of reliable search statistics from 10 years ago), search has been growing exponentially, as anyone with a pulse and an Internet connection already knows. For example:

• North Americans conducted approximately 4.2 billion searches in March 2004 (source: http://www.comscore.com/press/release.asp?press=458).
  
• North Americans conducted approximately 16 billion searches in August 2007 (source: http://www.comscore.com/press/release.asp?press=1802).
  

Now, I'm not very good at math, but even I can calculate 20% of 4.2 billion—840 million—and 10% of 16 billion—1.6 billion.

Even if we give Mr. Tancer the completely unreasonable benefit of assuming that there was no search growth from 1998 to 2004, and none again since 2007, the past ten years have seen the number of searches for porn double, not drop off. Young people aren't spending any less time searching for porn, they're just spending that much more time on the Internet.

Phew. Although I don't think I'll be hiring Hitwise any time soon.

Facebook: Easier than Spying on Your Neighbors

Dearest Facebook,

I love how you make it easy to keep up with people. Until the day comes when you're no longer a popular destination on the web, I don't need to update people's contact information once I'm their "friend" on your site. People keep their own contact information current.

I hate how you make it easy to keep up with people in the most voyeuristic way possible. Just glancing at your landing page exposes me to a psychodrama that I sometimes wish I could unsee.

Target Demographic?

Grand Theft Auto IV was released today. For those unfamiliar with the GTA series, here's how IGN described the game action: you "blow up cop cars, run down innocent civilians, bang hookers, assist drug dealers and lowlifes and do many, many other bad deeds." I've never actually played the game, but apparently it has inspired gameplay—inspiring, at least, reviewers to describe it in glowing terms, such as a "thoroughly compelling work of cultural satire disguised as fun."

Nonetheless, I think that Rockstar Games might have overreached their target demographic with the ad buy I noticed this morning:


In case you can't make them out, some of the headlines on the page are:
Consumer Confidence Slips as Home Prices Drop;
China Jails 30 Tibetans for Riots; and
Clinton Seeks Gas Tax Break; Obama Says No.

Kids These Days

I like blogging (yesterday's social media), but like Garfield, I find aspects of the current generation of social media – namely, Facebook & Twitter – to be baffling.

I have a Facebook profile, for despite its many faults, it's a great way of keeping a persistent contact list updated by your contacts. They change their email addresses, etc. so you don't have to.

The problem with Facebook is that it infantilizes adults. No, I don't want to be a zombie, or a pirate, or learn what Smurf I am, or play fake Scrabble with you. I'm 31. I have a baby. It just ain't worth my time.

Twitter's another matter entirely. I created a Twitter account for this blog weeks ago, but never bothered to update it because, well, Twitter is pointless. Twitter is a micro-blogging platform that broadcasts your status to people who care. This is a gigantic waste of time & attention.

Steph apparently discovered Twittering this morning. Her initial reaction sums up my feelings almost exactly:

What Emily Post Didn't Anticipate

I had planned to just keep my typing fingers still until the end of April (at which point the powers of academia will either fail me or pass me on to the next set of flaming hoops), but I am faced with an ethical dilemma to which I have no answer.

What do you do when you get a friend request from someone you don't know? Or worse yet, someone you know and just don't like all that much?

If I were a member of the 19th century landed gentry, I could invite the caller into my sitting room for cigars, and allow him no further and offer him sub-par sherry. That would have certainly driven home the message and no one would lose face or social grace.

Thoughts from the public are welcome.

Google: Because We Can, Primaries Edition

At risk of feeding Andy's addiction, I just discovered that Google Maps and Google Earth now do election results.

New Hampshire: Map, Dems in Earth, GOP in Earth

Iowa and Wyoming seem to have predated this particular hack.

Of course, I'm sure that the map's default of showing Democratic results will feed the conspiracy theories that the liberal technology sector is working against the right.

Update (1/10/2008): I stand corrected — they do have, at least, Iowa results in Maps. And I'm a bit behind the curve; at least the Earth version was introduced for the 2006 midterm elections. They don't appear to have a central clearinghouse for each of these links, unfortunately.

Two Laptops, No Children

Just a few months after One Laptop Per Child (OLPC)'s triumphant launch, the effort has been dealt a major blow: Intel has withdrawn its support for the program. This is the latest in a series of difficulties the program has faced — it had already doubled its price-point goal of $100 and drastically lowered sales expectations due to unexpected competition.

Technologically and financially, Intel's support is not critical to the success of OLPC; it runs on an AMD chip, and the company had only made good on a third of its promised $18 million donation. No, the real problem is that the dispute arose over Intel's Classmate PC. The Classmate is, arguably, a well-designed classroom computer that governments appear to prefer to the OLPC. Depending on which account you read, the arrangement fell through either because OLPC wanted Intel to abandon the Classmate or because Intel's sales organization was intentionally undermining the OLPC.

If you care about OLPC's mission, which is more accurate doesn't really matter. The real problem is that while most accounts have suggested that the Classmate and the OLPC are head-to-head products (along with the Asus Eee PC), that isn't the case. The OLPC is a fundamentally new product, whereas the Classmate and the Eee PC are not. While the latter two are, at best, very well built laptops that are affordable for developing countries, the OLPC is a very well built educational tool that is designed to serve developing countries.

Consider:

• The OLPC was designed to be run where electricity is a scarce and unreliable commodity: running for 5 hours — potentially twice that in ebook mode — on a full battery (the Classmate runs a typical 2-4 hours) and rechargeable by hand.
• The OLPC automatically creates a mesh network in the presence of other OLPCs and can detect WiFi signals up to 2 kilometers away (compared to standard WiFi on the Classmate).
• A core capability of the OLPC is eToys, a game-like, graphical, educational programming environment (on the other hand, the Classmate can run Office!).

Having experienced the local school board's decision to switch from Mac to Windows when I was in high school, based on the well-intentioned but utterly false supposition that learning on Windows better prepares one for a Windows-based workplace, I am not surprised that governments are choosing the Classmate. Who wouldn't choose the machine backed by a multibillion dollar company, running the software that every other country runs?

But if you're a kid in Iraq, where the electricity is on 8-12 hours a day, or Afghanistan, where "normal" Internet access is only available via satellite, which laptop would you want?

One Laptop Per Child: Give One. Get One.

Back in 2005, I was at the conference in San Francisco where Nicholas Negroponte first announced that he and others at the MIT Media Lab intended to sell a laptop for $100 with the goal of putting a laptop in the hands of every child the world over.

That mission has since become One Laptop Per Child, an organization that has just started manufacturing these machines for use around the world. Rather than describe at length the wonders of this little machine, I encourage you to watch this review from the New York Times' inimitable David Pogue.

On the theory that this machine is targeted at the developing world and that sales to rich countries would unduly divert computers away from kids who desperately need these devices today, it's going to be pretty difficult for you to get your hands on one. That's right, you can't buy one.

Well, that is, starting in two weeks you can't buy one.

For the next 15 days, you can buy one of these remarkable machines through a program called "Give One Get One." For $400, you can buy a laptop and pay for a laptop to go to a child in the developing world. As a bonus, you'll get a one year subscription to T-Mobile's Hot Spot service. (As Amos pointed out to me, the T-Mobile promotion, which can be used on any wifi-compatible device, appears to have a retail value of $360.)

Smarty Pants

This cool gizmo lets you know what level of education is required to understand a given blog.

Radiohead's In Rainbows: Online and Available for Free (or for Whatever Seems Fair)

Absurdly talented rock band Radiohead is a band unencumbered by a record contract. Thus, they can do great things like offer their new album In Rainbows available for download directly to their users without having to ask anyone's permission.

Since Radiohead gets 100% of the proceeds of the record (instead of the meager slice they'd get from a deal with a record company), they're comfortable letting users download the record and name their own price. Grab it for free if you'd like. I paid £5.00. That seemed fair.

The tracks don't have any accompanying cover art. Make you own art or obtain the Radiohead-blessed art here if you'd like to have something pretty staring back at you when you listen to the track on your music player.

Making Mannahatta

Following up on my 1685 map post of 2 weeks ago, the New Yorker has an online slide show with computer-generated images that attempt to depict Manhattan (probably from the Lenape "Mannahatta" (Island of Many Hills)) as it was in 1609.

Although I'm a new and almost certainly a temporary New Yorker, permit me to speak as one for a moment. As a New Yorker, the shape of Manhattan is etched in my mind. If you live in this city, you see it every time you take the subway. You could draw it in the dark.

To see it bare of buildings and concrete and landfill is just haunting.

(Hat tip to Gothamist)

Microwave Cookery

On a recent trip to a local sandwich shop, I noticed something unusual about the shop’s microwave oven.


It is unclear from this cell-phone photo whether the aluminum foil is replacing a broken viewing window or whether the shop owner is reassuring his customers that he is not reading their minds. Regardless, the tears in the foil can’t be good.

Drama Chipmunks/Prairie Dogs & the DMCA

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Skype Video: Enabling Full-Color Lullabies from 1,000 Miles Away

When I became a dad, some aspects of my previous life came to a screeching halt. Some continued unabated. Still others mutated into a strange and heretofore unknown form. My fascination with technology & gear falls into this last category.

Sure, I still go gaa-gaa over the newest gadgets and grown-up toys, but suddenly I find myself having strong opinions about an entirely different set of gadgets:

• I suddenly have strong feelings about a certain type of swaddling blanket that I consider to be superior.
• If left unchecked, I will ramble on at length about why today's cradle toys put the toys of my youth to shame.
• I gaze in wide-eyed wonder at the incredible absorption qualities of the modern diaper and its awesome next-generation Velcro straps.

I have become a gear-obsessed dad.

My appreciation for most of this stuff doesn't rise to the level of wanting to blog about it, but there is one technology whose utility rises above the rest from this parent's perspective: Skype Video. Instead of blathering on about how great Skype is, I'll permit the picture below to provide the bulk of the explanation:


Yes, that's an actual picture of four generations of my family on one screen during a video conference earlier this evening.

Yes, that's a technology built from the ground up to handle video conferencing (as opposed to other services that include video conferencing as an afterthought).

Yes, that's a service that is 100% free.

According to Google Maps, my hometown is a short 1,385 mile drive from where I currently live, so suffice it to say that I've become accustomed to not seeing my family every weekend. Skype has shortened this distance for my family, letting my parents, my grandparents, my brother, and Steph's family (a short 2,936 mile drive away) interact with Katie in a way that just blows my mind.

Katie already responds to the screen, staring at the faces, reacting to their speech (and their occasional singing). I feel so fortunate that we've found this way of sharing her growth with my far-away family. I can't wait to see where we go from here.

(Incidentally, the camera that took that great screen capture is our new Fujifilm FinePix F30. Very affordable and I've never seen a point-and-shoot digital camera work so well in low light conditions.)

Transatlantic Road Trip

Thank you, Andy, for introducing me to the Sauntering community. I shall strive to live up to his high standards of journalism. That said, I hope you enjoy my first blog post.

Ever have that urge to take a nice long drive? Well, Google maps can help you relive Lindbergh’s famous transatlantic flight from New York to Paris. This time, it's a road trip! (Hat tip: Andrew Obus)



You might consider driving this route in one of these amphibious vehicles:

Google Earthy-mander

(Crossposted from the American Constitution Society :: Columbia Law School)

Google has just added a bevy of election information to its fantastic Google Earth product.

Users of Google Earth will notice a new layer called "2006 US Election Guide." Once activated this layer displays red lines to indicate our various Congressional districts, along with information regarding candidates purusing these seats this November.

Below is a snapshot of those candidates pursuing Tom DeLay's vacated 22nd District, Texas seat.



Far more interesting than the information available about candidates is this easy birds-eye view of the gerrymandering that has captured our system. Click on any of the cities below to see the monsters that Safe Seat congressional districting has created:

Los Angeles	New York City
Dallas/Ft. Worth	Philadelphia

You can download Google Earth for free here.

Thanks, Don!