The future is now

broderic on February 9, 2006

The latest flick from my Netflix queue is The Triumph of the Nerds: The Rise of Accidental Empires. This was a documentary on the rise of the personl computer industry done around 1996, the Jurassic period in computer epochs.

The narrator was Robert X. Cringely who used to write a weekly column about the movers and shakers of Silicon Valley. He writes an online column for PBS.org and has very insightful things to say about the industry. I read his writings every week. This week he explains why Jobs is good for Disney. Read it. Then go buy stock in Apple. Jobs is just that good.

Anyway, back to the DVD. The story ends in 1996. Windows 95 was just released and the internet had yet to become the ubiquitous thing it is today. At the end, Cringely goes over the fortunes of the main players: Gates, Microsoft, Jobs, and Apple.

In 1996, Apple’s fortunes were down and it looked as if the end was near. Steve Jobs was 10 years in exile from Apple after being unceremoniously dumped in 1986. He was just the CEO of a little animation company Pixar. Oh and also of a small startup NeXT computing.

In 1996, Bill Gates was the richest man in America. Microsoft was the dominant computer company. It was good to be a Microserf.

In 1996, Larry Ellison, CEO of Oracle, preached the joy of the internet and the future of computing as a thin client connected to the Web. The PC was not in the picture.

What happened in the PC industry in those 10 years until now?

Microsoft still got bigger. Is still the 100lb gorilla of the personal computer industry. Apple did not fail. It has become a major player in the new computing world order. Bill Gates is a successful philanthropist and is the richest man in the world. Larry Ellison is a nobody. Steve Jobs is now the head of Disney.

Cringely closes the show with an acknowledgement that the industry will always be changing. He said that it would take 30 years for society to find uses for technology that has been introduced. In 1996, the personal computing industry had been around for about 20 years. He said he would like to revisit the Silicon Valley players in 10 years. It is now 2006. I wonder what he will find?

A billion souls crying out…

broderic on February 9, 2006

… for music.

Can you win at the billionth iTunes download? Check out the prizes. $10,000 worth songs. How many albums is that? Or even how many TV shows?

You can buy or use this entry form to enter. No purchase necessary. For those running Tiger, use this dashboard widget to help estimate when to enter.

Good luck. And if you win can I get one of those iPods. Thanks in advance.

“The sleeper has awoken!”

broderic on February 5, 2006

I see from APCB that the powers that be are releasing an extended version of Dune. No not the scifi channel’s remake, but the honest god goodness of David Lynch’s masterpiece. This is something to watch out for.

100,000 miles and running

broderic on February 3, 2006

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100000
100000,
originally uploaded by browsermetrics.

Today my car has past the 100K mile mark. It occurred around 8 AM on 695 right under the Stevenson Rd. overpass. You can check the last hundred miles until I reached this mark in my flickr account. Check the set out.

Upgrade

broderic on February 2, 2006

Just upgraded my TiBook to 10.4 (Tiger). The only thing so far not working is my VirtuaDesktop. I hope they have a fix.

Update: CodeTek, the makers of VirtualDesktop, did put out version 3.2 to address the needs of Tiger upgraders.

I have also noticed that things are just a tad slower.

I need an image consultant

broderic on January 31, 2006

I need to change the layout of my blog. If I this was a few years back, I could’ve done it myself. Now, I am to lazy to find out how to make changes this site’s HTML code. Sad, but true. I need help.

Underworld (D)Evolution

broderic on January 30, 2006

When I saw the first Underworld, I was slightly impressed. I don’t go for vampires. No fascination with them whatsoever. Yet, this war with werewolves was intriguing. If I had blogged the movie back then, my review would’ve been a solid 3 of 5 stars. Mediocre but watchable.

Well the sequel to Underworld had opened up last week and I had to watch it. I confess that I was anticipating it for the last month. Not only for Kate Beckinsale in tight leather, but to finish up the story. I was sorely disappointed. In fact, I think I was played for the fool.

This sequel starts off perhaps minutes after the last, but it is light years from the first. I can’t believe that this was the same setting as the last. It seems as if the writer and the director wanted to throw out everything good about the previous film and start anew. And where they started was at the core of Blood Rayne (I have not seen it, but I am sure it is just as crappy). It then flows into a mire of crap. The trilogy seemed condensed into a two-parter. Perhaps they knew with this stinker of a movie that they could not tell it all because they’ll all be fired by then. There was more chases, more Kate Beckinsale skin (a plus!!), and more vampires. After the defeat of the werewolves there was no more enemy except themselves. Vampire v. Vampire. As Butthead would’ve said, “This sucks, Beavis.” What happened?

Don’t make the third installment. I won’t watch it after being robbed.

2 of 5 stars. For the naked side of Kate Beckinsale.

January 28, 1986

broderic on January 29, 2006

I was sitting in the Common Room with an early free period. I think it was day 2 and Religion wasn’t schedule for then. I had just settled down on the couch with some friends when someone came from the library.

“The shuttle has exploded.”
“Bullshit.”
“They’re showing it on tv in the library.”

We got up, went to the library and watched. What a catastrophe! I remember the iconic plumes of the solid rocket boosters, twisting free from the wreckage. I remember them doing their death spiral down until self-detonation. I remember the rain of debris as they seemingly floated gently down to splash into the ocean.

Twenty years ago. Yet it is still vivid in memory. I have had a morbid fascination with that event ever since and have read lots on the subject. Things an engineer has to know. Murphy’s Law. Blind luck. Pure fate. The gods have spoken.

NASA history of the Challenger tragedy.

CocoaRadio

broderic on January 27, 2006

For all you Mac programmers out there (Pretty soon there’ll be many), if you haven’t heard the CocoaRadio podcast, then what are you waiting for? Each is a good long interview, but the programmers he gets are the cream of the crop. Listen to them, one can easily imagine that one can attain the life.

Someday soon…