What is an idea? Just a random thought that flirts with your gray cells when a butterfly in Hawai'i flutters its wings? Not quite - an idea is something deeper. It is the understanding and appreciation of a sequence of events that sneaks in through the doors of your sub-conscious and jolts those gray cells. Sometimes these ideas are momentous, like the grand idea of holding the Commonwealth Games in an, mostly, impoverished nation. But sometimes, they lead to movies like 'Inception'.
Let me first represent the inner fanboi and get him out of the way. Absolutely.Brilliant.Period.*panting hard*
There. Done. Now, to something disappointing. Let me state one assumption first. This was a work of science fiction which relied on some, amazingly, imaginative and expensive graphics to get across a relatively simple story - dreams within dreams within dreams surrounded by the ether of limbo. Will anyone explain to me now, why anybody would go expecting to see a believable story? A story about betrayal, love and random coincidences affecting the lives of the protagonists? Is this 'Ghosts of Girlfriends Past'? Why have people lost the urge to unfetter their imagination and take in a movie, not as a reflection on society and laden with hidden,inner meaning, but as an outlet of creativity, waiting to absorb us, the viewers, into the story and make us peripheral characters?
If there has been a recent movie which has attempted to gauge the role of NPCs this was it. Projections of people, hazily or clearly remembered, over the gulf of time play a bigger part in the proceedings than anyone else. How difficult is it then to loose yourself into the mazes for under 150 minutes and to spirit yourself away into worlds that never were, that never will be? No, no I am not asking you to become a D&D fanatic and name your first born, Eomer. All I am saying is suspend belief and enjoy the movie on its own worth. All this pseudo philosophical blabber is disappointing. The worse culprits are the ones who apply OOP principles. Limbo is shared state or singleton, my arse!
Stories do not need to obey physics. If they did we wouldn't read the Ramayana or the Odyssey. They are an outporing of creation. How many of you have found 'Two States' believable? Has anyone heard of people eating Molagai Podi without Idhayam? Still, pander to prejudices and get away with it. Pander to creativity beyond the accepted physical dimensions and get crucified. Un-effing-believable.The breadth of creative genius that has Nolan making a freaking train go through Manhattan and have Paris tilt itself on the perpendicular is plain amazing. In any case, why search for logic when you can see Ellen Page for 30 minutes and go home happy?
Good stories are tough to adapt into movies which arouse your imagination. To dismiss such a movie because you fail to immerse yourself in it; that is just mean-spirited.
17.8.10
Hiatus and returns
To the one dedicated reader, thanks for sitting it out and retaining me on your RSS reader. I have a feeling, the number of posts are slightly going to go up.
So, it has been 5 months since the last post. A very, very interesting and exciting 5 months. There are things which still are murky and cannot be revealed, exciting nevertheless.
In the last 5 months, Hawai'i happened. It was the most brilliant week of my life. Even waiting for a hour and half at the local laundromat in Volcano, HI was awesome. Words fail me - they truly do. It would be easier to describe the half-remembered visions at daybreak, when the toothpaste hits the right spot on the gums. Describing Hawai'i on the other hand - pretty much impossible. The beauty of Kauai, the lushness of Maui, the volcanoes and isolation of Hawai'i - where could I start and where would I finish? And the beaches - the red, green, yellow, white and black sand beaches, everyone of them felt like a tiny universe. Even walking on the tiny 100 meter wide Red sand, clothing optional, beach at Kahilulu, was like stepping off the rim of our discworld and falling off, unheard, unseen onto a different cosmos.
This is one memory I am only going to share with SWMBO. 7 days in paradise which only belong to *us* and which we shall, both, guard selfishly and cherish as we grow older, together. Unlike Rick and Ilsa, we shall have, always, our Hawai'i.
So, it has been 5 months since the last post. A very, very interesting and exciting 5 months. There are things which still are murky and cannot be revealed, exciting nevertheless.
In the last 5 months, Hawai'i happened. It was the most brilliant week of my life. Even waiting for a hour and half at the local laundromat in Volcano, HI was awesome. Words fail me - they truly do. It would be easier to describe the half-remembered visions at daybreak, when the toothpaste hits the right spot on the gums. Describing Hawai'i on the other hand - pretty much impossible. The beauty of Kauai, the lushness of Maui, the volcanoes and isolation of Hawai'i - where could I start and where would I finish? And the beaches - the red, green, yellow, white and black sand beaches, everyone of them felt like a tiny universe. Even walking on the tiny 100 meter wide Red sand, clothing optional, beach at Kahilulu, was like stepping off the rim of our discworld and falling off, unheard, unseen onto a different cosmos.
This is one memory I am only going to share with SWMBO. 7 days in paradise which only belong to *us* and which we shall, both, guard selfishly and cherish as we grow older, together. Unlike Rick and Ilsa, we shall have, always, our Hawai'i.
23.3.10
Hedy Lamarr and finding my tech heroine
Looking back from the heights of current human achievement, the interwebs of 4chan and twitter, Maxwell probably doesn't seem all that important. Yet, it was his contributions which laid the groundwork to the laws of electromagnetism and all its myriad applications. The precursor to the internet and a direct descendant of Maxwell's efforts was, of course, telephony and mobile networks - trying to capture human voice and transmitting it to gap distances and give, in an analog way of course, a glimpse (largely) into people's mundane chores. One of the most fascinating technologies for mobile networks is Frequency Hopping Spread Spectrum, which leads to one of my favorite off-beat personalities - Hedy Lamarr.
Hedy Lamarr is remembered mostly for her looks, on-screen nudity, being Delilah and those flaming,wild eyes. But what a lot of people are ignorant of is her co-patent for a Frequency Hopping Spread Spectrum device. Based on a piano roll, to generate 88 frequencies, for a carrier to bounce between in a pseudorandom sequence, the patent she co-wrote is a precursor to those ubiquitous Qualcomm chips. It was designed as an anti-jamming device for use by the Allies in the Second World War. But it never took off in her time, it was very military oriented and remained buried for over 20 years. What *is* fascinating though, is her success to mix two disparate fields - Hollywood and technology, bringing about what is truly a revolution in todays world. In today's dreary 9 to 5 technology cycle, it encourages me greatly to see this example of the art of science; to see that people who discriminate between arts and sciences and dismiss creativity in technology by applying labels - 'Designer This' or 'Developer That' - are wrong.
When I think of Hedy Lamarr, I can only think of the triumph of creativity over hidebound technology and the victory of science over elitist artists. That is why she is an inspiration and my choice for Ada Lovelace day.
Bootnote: I have purposefully added no links, save one, as an experiment.
Hedy Lamarr is remembered mostly for her looks, on-screen nudity, being Delilah and those flaming,wild eyes. But what a lot of people are ignorant of is her co-patent for a Frequency Hopping Spread Spectrum device. Based on a piano roll, to generate 88 frequencies, for a carrier to bounce between in a pseudorandom sequence, the patent she co-wrote is a precursor to those ubiquitous Qualcomm chips. It was designed as an anti-jamming device for use by the Allies in the Second World War. But it never took off in her time, it was very military oriented and remained buried for over 20 years. What *is* fascinating though, is her success to mix two disparate fields - Hollywood and technology, bringing about what is truly a revolution in todays world. In today's dreary 9 to 5 technology cycle, it encourages me greatly to see this example of the art of science; to see that people who discriminate between arts and sciences and dismiss creativity in technology by applying labels - 'Designer This' or 'Developer That' - are wrong.
When I think of Hedy Lamarr, I can only think of the triumph of creativity over hidebound technology and the victory of science over elitist artists. That is why she is an inspiration and my choice for Ada Lovelace day.
Bootnote: I have purposefully added no links, save one, as an experiment.
23.2.10
Book review: The Monuments Men
The Monuments Men: Allied Heroes, Nazi Thieves, and the Greatest Treasure Hunt in History is a solid read I picked up last month thanks to ShopSavvy. The book walks us through a very detailed history of the Allied effort in the later half of the Second World War to preserve, protect and retrieve arts of work stolen by the invading Nazis in Occupied Western Europe.
Its a small window into a part of the war, of which I have only had glimpses before. But it makes for some fascinating reading. Its not really a book for beginner World War 2 students, I think, since it makes for some slow and possibly fragmented reading. A collection of connected essays tied together by original letters from the Allied officers, its strength lies in its narrative which tracks the pieces of art and the efforts of the officers rather than the bigger, strategic picture of the Second World War. A lot of good books tend to dive into the more glamorous side-stories at the expense of the main theme of the essay.
It was a little heavy going at first as I wrapped my mind around the number of people involved and the sudden shifts (sometimes over time) that kept throwing me off - till I realized the main theme was the tracking of the actual artifacts NOT the people. That is definitely an aspect of the war which has been missing for some time. The focus of any popular war book has lain in the narrative of tactical and strategic themes, supplemented by personal narratives be it The Longest Day or Is Paris Burning? Where this book differs in is the focus is on pieces of art, which capture your imagination and have you rooting for their safety and recovery.
Definitely worth a read. Plus for some reason the hard cover is really, really cheap on Amazon.
It was a little heavy going at first as I wrapped my mind around the number of people involved and the sudden shifts (sometimes over time) that kept throwing me off - till I realized the main theme was the tracking of the actual artifacts NOT the people. That is definitely an aspect of the war which has been missing for some time. The focus of any popular war book has lain in the narrative of tactical and strategic themes, supplemented by personal narratives be it The Longest Day or Is Paris Burning? Where this book differs in is the focus is on pieces of art, which capture your imagination and have you rooting for their safety and recovery.
Definitely worth a read. Plus for some reason the hard cover is really, really cheap on Amazon.
21.2.10
Buzzes, location and privacy
Google launched Buzz more than a week ago. Having had that time to actually use it, before I start excoriating it, I have to admit major disappointment, bar a few really cool surprises.
Buzz is an obvious knockoff of Friendfeed - with a slight twist. The general idea is, of course, the aggregation of inputs from different sites - famously, twitter and Google Reader - into a unified stream. FriendFeed does the same thing, but the twist is Gmail Integration. Waves notwithstanding, email still remains the most popular way of communicating with others. And of course a ready made user base for pushing your latest offering is a temptaion no one can resist - even the always-do-gooders.
The primary problem - described as an EPIC fail - was the fact that sharing was turned on automagically with some of your contacts, giving rise to problems like the 'ex who can now stalk me by looking at my already public feeds and known friends' and the 'business partners who must have no insight into my personal life and no idea that I work for the competition as well' problems. Eric Schmidt, ceo @ google, had famously said about using Google products, 'Don't do stuff you want to keep private' and thats seems to have permeated the very essence of Buzz. I am not convinced this loss of privacy amounts to much. Let me clarify - The idea of exposing email addresses of people commenting was probably not the best, it opens up spam traps and what not. And I still think that for a lot of people having no control or having control hidden behind 3+ mouse clicks (where Buzz put its controls) is not very convenient. I see that as a failure of the design, not of the general intent though.
That said, I am not sure I would be too much concerned about this. Social media is a different ball game - you want your profile publicized as much as possible. True, google didn't get it correct, but here's the problem - start with a clean slate like Google Wave did and you have no idea what to do. By giving you the option - first by auto-add and then later, by auto-suggest - on whom to add from your known contacts is definitely a great way to start networking. I personally do not care about losing that privacy and staying within the confines of some sort of closed garden. I cannot justify this anymore or less - privacy is a deeply private issue and everyone has differing interpretaitons of how "private" privacy on the internet really is or should be.
In any case, thats not what gets me excited about Buzz. One of the main draws is the pubsubhubbub implementation backing Buzz. I had speculated sometime back on what the killer app to the Google backed protocol would be and was a little disappointed that there wasn't any more than RSS publishing to it. And bang - Google comes up with Activity streams and inbuilt support for multiple blogging engines. Any time you publish a post, you can almost immediately see it in your Buzz listings. Thats fantastic! Wave is a synchronous collaboration platform, but Buzz is its async sibling, without the bells and whistles of course. It's "almost" real time which for most of us works for the bigger part of our online interactions. Google released some apis for using Buzz, but its more like a pubsubhubbub how-to guide for Buzz streams. What I am waiting for is the part they haven't released yet - read/write support for your own streams with authentication and the salmon protocol and of course with pubsubhubbub. This is the beginning of the push-button web and the closest most of us ever get to real-time updates in our lifetimes.
The killer though can be explained in 3 words - location, location and location. I have an Android 1.6 based phone and Buzz was only available through the Google Maps for Mobile 4.0 release. Thats how I started off and boy,oh,boy is location integration with Google Services awesome! I am in Philadelphia and I buzz about visiting the Liberty Bell - et voila, someone gives me a virtual guide to the bell. I am out at work and am able to view buzzes on people offering instant information on doctors, restaurants, gas stations - anything you want to know about in your neighborhood. And once that is offered, you can search for it, read comments on it, reviews about it - anything the internet can offer you about this place. The best part is all of this information can be (at some point of time, I hope) attached to a public buzz based on keywords and be made available anytime. The flip side is of course, search engine ads (its not just Google, every search engine does it. Ads are their bread and butter.) and not having seen how bad ads can get on the phone, lets wait and see. But location is the killer Buzz feature - if you don't have location enabled you are missing out on something really big.
The elephant in the room is Facebook, of course. They have come out with a supposedly "titanic"email solution which everyone talks about, their rear-prodding XMPP-based IM solution which nobody uses and their growing interest in location and mobile technology.
Yes, I know it is useless to be updated on people's locations, with their corny status updates and useless tips. That is the failing of almost all things social now. The best you can do is put a status update about you using the restroom and finding no toilet paper. But, consider todays web applications - anytime you want to find out the next assignment your professor has put up, you have to go to a website, click on the links and possibly click through to the next assignment. With these "almost" real time solutions, you have it on a phone based or a desktop client. Now replace 'assignments' with weather, sports, travel information and add location in the mix and what an exciting future that is for us consumers. The social ecosystem that Buzz is building can lead to more and I hope, better web applications.
Buzz is just a short step into this future. The design is awful, which convinces me it is not going to be the final vehicle or even the most popular one. But the magnitude of Gmail users - an automatic recruit base for Buzz makes me confident Buzz will lead the way.
Buzz is an obvious knockoff of Friendfeed - with a slight twist. The general idea is, of course, the aggregation of inputs from different sites - famously, twitter and Google Reader - into a unified stream. FriendFeed does the same thing, but the twist is Gmail Integration. Waves notwithstanding, email still remains the most popular way of communicating with others. And of course a ready made user base for pushing your latest offering is a temptaion no one can resist - even the always-do-gooders.
The primary problem - described as an EPIC fail - was the fact that sharing was turned on automagically with some of your contacts, giving rise to problems like the 'ex who can now stalk me by looking at my already public feeds and known friends' and the 'business partners who must have no insight into my personal life and no idea that I work for the competition as well' problems. Eric Schmidt, ceo @ google, had famously said about using Google products, 'Don't do stuff you want to keep private' and thats seems to have permeated the very essence of Buzz. I am not convinced this loss of privacy amounts to much. Let me clarify - The idea of exposing email addresses of people commenting was probably not the best, it opens up spam traps and what not. And I still think that for a lot of people having no control or having control hidden behind 3+ mouse clicks (where Buzz put its controls) is not very convenient. I see that as a failure of the design, not of the general intent though.
That said, I am not sure I would be too much concerned about this. Social media is a different ball game - you want your profile publicized as much as possible. True, google didn't get it correct, but here's the problem - start with a clean slate like Google Wave did and you have no idea what to do. By giving you the option - first by auto-add and then later, by auto-suggest - on whom to add from your known contacts is definitely a great way to start networking. I personally do not care about losing that privacy and staying within the confines of some sort of closed garden. I cannot justify this anymore or less - privacy is a deeply private issue and everyone has differing interpretaitons of how "private" privacy on the internet really is or should be.
In any case, thats not what gets me excited about Buzz. One of the main draws is the pubsubhubbub implementation backing Buzz. I had speculated sometime back on what the killer app to the Google backed protocol would be and was a little disappointed that there wasn't any more than RSS publishing to it. And bang - Google comes up with Activity streams and inbuilt support for multiple blogging engines. Any time you publish a post, you can almost immediately see it in your Buzz listings. Thats fantastic! Wave is a synchronous collaboration platform, but Buzz is its async sibling, without the bells and whistles of course. It's "almost" real time which for most of us works for the bigger part of our online interactions. Google released some apis for using Buzz, but its more like a pubsubhubbub how-to guide for Buzz streams. What I am waiting for is the part they haven't released yet - read/write support for your own streams with authentication and the salmon protocol and of course with pubsubhubbub. This is the beginning of the push-button web and the closest most of us ever get to real-time updates in our lifetimes.
The killer though can be explained in 3 words - location, location and location. I have an Android 1.6 based phone and Buzz was only available through the Google Maps for Mobile 4.0 release. Thats how I started off and boy,oh,boy is location integration with Google Services awesome! I am in Philadelphia and I buzz about visiting the Liberty Bell - et voila, someone gives me a virtual guide to the bell. I am out at work and am able to view buzzes on people offering instant information on doctors, restaurants, gas stations - anything you want to know about in your neighborhood. And once that is offered, you can search for it, read comments on it, reviews about it - anything the internet can offer you about this place. The best part is all of this information can be (at some point of time, I hope) attached to a public buzz based on keywords and be made available anytime. The flip side is of course, search engine ads (its not just Google, every search engine does it. Ads are their bread and butter.) and not having seen how bad ads can get on the phone, lets wait and see. But location is the killer Buzz feature - if you don't have location enabled you are missing out on something really big.
The elephant in the room is Facebook, of course. They have come out with a supposedly "titanic"email solution which everyone talks about, their rear-prodding XMPP-based IM solution which nobody uses and their growing interest in location and mobile technology.
Yes, I know it is useless to be updated on people's locations, with their corny status updates and useless tips. That is the failing of almost all things social now. The best you can do is put a status update about you using the restroom and finding no toilet paper. But, consider todays web applications - anytime you want to find out the next assignment your professor has put up, you have to go to a website, click on the links and possibly click through to the next assignment. With these "almost" real time solutions, you have it on a phone based or a desktop client. Now replace 'assignments' with weather, sports, travel information and add location in the mix and what an exciting future that is for us consumers. The social ecosystem that Buzz is building can lead to more and I hope, better web applications.
Buzz is just a short step into this future. The design is awful, which convinces me it is not going to be the final vehicle or even the most popular one. But the magnitude of Gmail users - an automatic recruit base for Buzz makes me confident Buzz will lead the way.
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