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Gymnopedie No.1 - Erik Satie (Tying in with minimalism....

Tue, 18 Nov 2008 17:28:00 -0800

Gymnopedie No.1 - Erik Satie (Tying in with minimalism. It’s also that time of year to cuddle up by the fire with a cup of coffee and listen)

Minimalism

Tue, 18 Nov 2008 17:07:00 -0800

Minimalism is the basic structure where the work is stripped down to its most fundamental features. Minimalism is reduced to it’s necessary elements therefore, driving ease of use and typically it is virtually rewarding.

Minimalist Art and Design

Minimalism may be a trend in design and architecture but, it too, is reduced to it’s core structure. Emerging in the 1950’s, minimalism is highly influenced by Japanese traditional design and architecture. The motto “Less is more” was adopted by popular German architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe in his tactic of creating new designs. Mies established a new architectural style that could represent modern times.

Minimalist Software

Adapting “Less is more” into the software aspect of things, people have come to adore user interfaces where minimalism is apparent in the overall design. Some of the best sites on the interweb today are popular and famous specifically because of that. I think companies like Apple and Twitter have had a very high success rate due to this core element being pushed with their products.

Minimalism in Code

Not knowing many programming languages (I’m working on it) I don’t know exactly which languages have the most crisp simplistic look or feel to them. However, some people prefer Haskell which has a very small, simple core based on a few mathematical properties. Whereas, some people love Java which has a library with a lot of common data structures, but also has many flaws (mostly related to inconsistency and overcomplexity). So possibly, it all has to do with who you are.

Conclusion

I think it is safe to say that minimalism in design is a turning point for most people no matter what the services being offered. Thriving on the simplicity allows you to experience the work more intensely without any distractions. All in all, people truly do enjoy getting the main element without all the things (shit) attached. The point is, I find minimalism to be a very valuable subject in which we should base our engineering, design, and art principles on.

"Nobody is everybody."

Sun, 16 Nov 2008 19:35:00 -0800

“Nobody is everybody.”

- Me

Public Education

Wed, 12 Nov 2008 19:50:38 -0800

Me: I love and hate how easily everything is, and how easily you can cheat and get away with something without actually learning something.
Brandon: Welcome to public education.:)

I Borrowed from Oprah

Wed, 12 Nov 2008 19:44:59 -0800

Brandon: Did you catch the Words of Wisdom this morning?
Me: Yeah.
Brandon: Borrowed it from Oprah. LOL.
Me: LOL. Nice, I thought it sounded familiar. ;)

5 Places to Find the Code You Need

Tue, 11 Nov 2008 22:25:00 -0800

Life is good when you can benefit and learn from other people’s code. Many people learn a new programming language, technique, or even a new idea by example. However, finding the right snippet of code to look at and learn from isn’t always an easy task. But this post, should help clarify that.

Google Code Search is probably the most popular. It’s the mac daddy of code search engines. Another high point is that their code search engine searches a ton of public source code repositories (it is Google afterall). And to put the cherry on the top, Google supports a ton of languages.

The next most popular one is github. Everybody in the programming community loves github. It’s most known for its open source code repository and version control web service. Despite being relatively new, github has gotten rather popular quite fast and (like Google) also has a ton of public repositories.

Snipplr is very well designed site giving you many options for your search. Like github, Snipplr is growing fairly quickly — with most of it’s snippets (over half) being added within the last year. An amazing feature offered with Snipplr is that they offer a handful of useful plug ins for Wordpress, Textmate, Firefox and Safari, as well as Getit, there is also a Snipplir Ruby Gem.

Now Krugle claims to be reaching to a third of all developers world wide and their enterprise search product powers code search for Amazon Web Services, Yahoo Developer Network, SourceForge.net and a few other big names. They also claim to carry over two and a half billion lines of open source code which would make them one of the largest source code searches on the web today.

If you’re a Ruby programmer, you’re probably going to favor Koders. They’re another big one claiming to search over a billion lines of code. Ruby is the fourth most searched language on the site.

Hopefully, now, you have an idea of where to get open source code for your next project. All of these definitely helped me out. It’s amazing what you can find out there.

A Failed Education System

Sun, 09 Nov 2008 12:05:00 -0800

In a recent Business Week article, I was reading about how Former House Speaker, Newt Gingrich, wants young people to shift more quickly from childhood to adulthood. I thought this was interesting for a number of reasons, but I’ll specify two.

First off, I agree with him on about 95 percent of the stuff he speaks about. Second off, it’s much harder to talk about it, then actually go about doing it. I’ve wrote about this topic a few years ago, and even since then, the public school system is still a bureaucratic system of technicalities.

Going through the American public education system gives me a first hand glance into it’s failed routine and policies. Every day I realize that students could be learning so much more in much less time. I believe that returning to an earlier, more successful model of children rapidly assuming the roles and responsibilities of adults would definitely yield enormous benefit to overall society. So being in school wasting so much time is not a help. Going to school for 180 days and only completing one grade is absurd; with all the time wasted, we could easily fit one and a quarter years or possibly even two if accelerated properly.

Now doing so would cause more pressure on students, but life in general has pressure. You can’t go and work for a world class company and slack off and mope around all day, it’s just not acceptable and you would be fired immediately; it’s just how the world works. I see this a lot in school, and personally, I don’t think it’s acceptable what-so-ever.

He goes on to talk about the costs of this “social experiment” have been horrendous. I agree. The information age has made learning a much quicker task and I don’t understand why we don’t use more technology based learning instead of traditional failed bureaucratic curriculum’s that slow the process of learning that is proved to not work properly. America is now behind China and India as far as education goes, we used to be the top dog and now, we are no where close.

He goes on to propose that school should be a money-making profession which in turn, would boost our competitiveness and revolutionize America’s poorest neighborhoods. He also states that if a high-school student graduates a year early, he/she should get a year scholarship, if they graduate two years early, he/she should get a two years of scholarships. This, would give students the incentive to study harder and would change America for the better.

Once we engage high school students in the real world process, it will completely transform America’s competitiveness, education system, and people.

Take Back the City - Snow Patrol

Sat, 08 Nov 2008 14:49:24 -0800

Take Back the City - Snow Patrol

"Any revolutionary change must be preceded by a passive, affirmative, non-challenging attitude toward..."

Fri, 07 Nov 2008 08:03:35 -0800

“Any revolutionary change must be preceded by a passive, affirmative, non-challenging attitude toward change among the mass of our people.”

- Saul Alinsky

Innovation of New Applications and Cloud Computing

Thu, 06 Nov 2008 16:40:05 -0800

I’ve been researching new technologies lately and where the web is headed, etcetera, and I’ve really been fascinated with cloud computing and the innovation of new applications.

There is a great article by Marc Benioff who is the CEO of salesforce.com on techcrunchit.com, about the evolution of the web and where we are going.

To sum up Web 1.0, he labeled it as: “Anyone Can Transact.” This section was basically about the emergence of apps from big companies like eBay, Google, and Amazon and how they released applications with a level of functionality, and ease of use.

Web 2.0 in the article was labeled as, “Anyone Can Participate.” Naturally this piece was on the next generation of applications and creating user-generated content, collaboration, and community. Applications that anyone can participate and use, still with a level of ease, but a more feature packed application. A new level of connectivity also arose out of this era.

Finally Web 3.0 which is where I was initially headed with this post. Marc labeled this as “Anyone Can Innovate.” This is how he layed it out:

Web 3.0 changes all of this by completely disrupting the technology and economics of the traditional software industry. The new rallying cry of Web 3.0 is that anyone can innovate, anywhere. Code is written, collaborated on, debugged, tested, deployed, and run in the cloud. When innovation is untethered from the time and capital constraints of infrastructure, it can truly flourish.

This entire article completely re-motivated me to get out there and innovate something. It also reminded me that I’m backed with the entire programming/application creation community and very smart and innovative minds which also re-assures and motivates me even further. It reminded me that these applications that anyone can innovate are drastically changing the Internet landscape and are radically changing the way we connect, share, and do business.

Not only did it motivate me to go out and create something awesome, it also motivated me to consider cloud computing. Although cloud computing is hardly a year old, I think it’s going to be one of the next biggest things for start-ups. Whether it be Amazon’s EC2 or Google Apps Engine, essentially, it’s not going to cost a thing to start a start up besides development time. But I’ll leave the whole topic for another post. :)

Get out and Vote! UPDATE: Yeah! My man won! Obama won! Barack...

Tue, 04 Nov 2008 16:51:00 -0800

Get out and Vote!

UPDATE: Yeah! My man won! Obama won! Barack Obama is officially the 44th President of the United States of America!

Don’t Vote - Part 2

Sat, 01 Nov 2008 15:39:54 -0700

Don’t Vote - Part 2

Audi’s New A1 Sportback Hybrid. Audi’s compact...

Sat, 01 Nov 2008 15:17:20 -0700

Audi’s New A1 Sportback Hybrid. Audi’s compact 5-door variation of the 3-door A1 project quattro car hybrid mode the car offers fuel consumption of 72.4 mpg

Obama ‘08 - Vote for Hope

Thu, 30 Oct 2008 16:35:41 -0700

Obama ‘08 - Vote for Hope

Lil Wayne - I’m Me

Wed, 29 Oct 2008 19:05:00 -0700

Lil Wayne - I’m Me

"As we look ahead into the next century, leaders will be those who empower others."

Wed, 29 Oct 2008 06:57:59 -0700

“As we look ahead into the next century, leaders will be those who empower others.”

- Bill Gates

Social Media is Revolutionizing The Political Process

Tue, 28 Oct 2008 22:04:00 -0700

It’s very apparent that social media is changing the political process. Without a doubt, it’s aiding political campaigns and organizations to become more confrontational to voters. Campaign managers from each campaign have tapped into the whole social media aspect of it and have taken advantage of it. I’ve noticed first hand that Obama has extensively been pushing the social media presence. I’ve noticed him on every social network I use (Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, and YouTube).

I think it is brilliant that his campaign is using this effective media outlet. I think tapping into this form of new media will help him snatch most of the young voters in the croud. Being that Obama is gathering a young croud using social media I think it’s safe to say that this election has engaged more people into the politcal process and has brought more attention and information to people than ever before.

The power of the internet has also made it quite easier for people to know what a candidate is doing at that specific time on that specific date which is very nice. It also allows anyone to see exactly what that candidate stands for. Obama (correct me if I’m wrong) has spent 2 times the amount of advertising on the internet than McCain has. Now I’m not hear to bash one candidate or the other but, it’s said, that whichever candidate spends the most on advertising, usually ends up winning the election.

If Obama wins, I would absolutely have to say that his internet campaign had a huge part in his victory. And I believe that social networking played a vital role in the American electoral climate.

A Thought on W.

Wed, 22 Oct 2008 06:58:37 -0700

I know Scripting News covered this as well, but the statement that Oliver Stone said about W. got me thinking too.

“I really, in my heart, think that this guy’s policies are going to be around for a long time. And my grandchildren are going to be talking about this guy Bush like the way they talk about Teddy Roosevelt, the way they talk about Lincoln, the way they talk about Washington. I think he’s had monumental impact on the future of this country.”

I agree with him. I think W. is probably going to be one of those Presidents that we talk and hear about for a very very long time. “Even if W wasn’t the greatest President, he did become President and that’s not easy to do as so many can testify. What he had down, what he knew how to do, was how to get elected President, because he has good genes, no matter how dumb you may think he is, he isn’t.” Let me also say I don’t don’t think W. was either the best president, or the worst.

After winning the Presidency, he didn’t know how to be President from lack of experience or whatever it was. Now hypothetically say Obama wins, is this going to happen again? Obama obviously has lack of experience. Are we just getting our hopes up or is he going to do what he says he will do? Or it it just all a campaign strategy? Well obviously some of it’s a campaign strategy, and others I hope he will follow through on.

It’s going to be a very difficult job taking over, I mean it’s like handing a frame to someone who has no clue how to build a car, and forcing them to build it. I guess that’s what they signed up for though. Just a thought that I was pondering after reading that post. Regardless, I hope Obama wins and he has my full support. The next year or so will be very interesting.

Blogging Dispute

Tue, 21 Oct 2008 21:08:00 -0700

Wired Magazine recently published an article in 16.11 stating how blogging is so 2004. With that said, I have to strongly disagree. The article states, that “witty blog prose is better spent expressing yourself on Flickr, Facebook, or Twitter,” I have to strongly disagree with that as well. Each one of those companies provides a specific service for creating media. For example, Flickr: Flickr is used for uploading photos, adding captions and sending them to your friends. How does that have anything to do with blogging? You might use them on your blog to paint a clearer picture for your readers by using that photograph and adding a caption beneath it, but uploading and sharing that picture does not declare it as blogging.

Most of those services are in the form of social network too. Blogs aren’t far from social networks, but yet, they are. You have readers that critique what you’re writing about, and give you instant feedback. On a social network, you’re connecting with friends and pushing personal information back and forth between friends and family. In my eyes, I see a major difference.

I understand how many people for instance, Jason Calacanis and Scoble are switching their blogging styles and using Twitter as their main micro blogging source. And Calacanis being more personal sending out an email every so often. But Twitter is a micro blogging service and it asks a question, “What are you doing?” and you’re limited to 140 characters. I see Twitter as more of a note taking service than anything, not a blogging service. You’re able to push out tid bits of information to you’re followers. I love the service and use it religiously, but it doesn’t replace blogging in any way.

On this blog, I usually don’t write a post for every tweet I post to Twitter (otherwise I’d have over 2,344 posts), I just find that unusual, not very useful and particularly uneffective. I see a huge gap there, I’d rather blog about more important things and get more in depth and express in unlimited characters what I’m trying to say.

I believe that if a blog has pleasing and positive content, it will be appreciated and discovered. So I do think that blogs are still relevant, convenient, and very effective on the interwebs today.

Most of the comments on the Wired article were pretty rude and stingy therefore, I don’t dare repeat them, but sorry dude, I have to take the commenter’s side on this one, and express that I couldn’t disagree more.

The iTunes Music Store Has Power

Sun, 19 Oct 2008 00:19:00 -0700

At the beginning of the month many people were very skeptical on the whole thing with the iTunes Music Store and the Copyright Royalty Board. The reason? Music publishers asked the board to increase the royalties paid to publishers and songwriters for the sale of digital downloads from 9 cents to 15 cents per song, which is absolutely outrageous.

So Apple, with the immense power that they have, threatened the board to shut down the iTunes Store, which for label companies would be a huge burden on revenue. I heard a statistic awhile back where the iTunes Store makes up 6 percent of music sales (I’m sure it’s much higher now). Now that people, is a lot of power.

Apple said they love making money, and if publishers got their wish, the iTunes Store would no longer be profitable for either parties. If fact, the increase would probably result in a financial loss for Apple, and Apple is definitely in it for the money.

Apple already pays their publishers 65 to 70 cents per song, and with this 66 percent increase publishers would get 15 cents more per song. Now anyone who can threaten the Copyright Royalty Board and get their way, has an immense amount of power in that niche.