Verizon Says Don't Be Stupid

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"You see? You see? Your stupid minds!
Stupid! Stupid!"

"You see? You see? Your stupid minds!
Stupid! Stupid!" 01/06/2004 03:19 AM

Jack Valenti says stupid things --
really, really stupid things

Jack Valenti says stupid things --
really, really stupid things 08/03/2004 07:46 PM
Tim Wu has rounded up some of the dumbest things that Jack Valenti said -- and he's found some real howlers, things that make Jack's infamous condemnation of the VCR ("the Boston Stranger of the American film industry") look like a walk in the park.

On the nascent cable industry, in 1974
"[Cable will become] a huge parasite in the marketplace, feeding and fattening itself off of local television stations and copyright owners of copyrighted material. We do not like it because we think it wrong and unfair."

On the dangers on media concentration, 1984 Op-Ed
"Will a democratic society allow just three corporate entities to wield unprecedented dominion over television, the most decisive voice in the land? There are now only three national networks .... There will never be more than three national networks."

On the public domain, 1995
"A public domain work is an orphan. No one is responsible for its life. But everyone exploits its use, until that time certain when it becomes soiled and haggard, barren of its previous virtues. How does the consumer benefit from the steady decline of a film's quality?"

Link (Thanks, Patricio!)

Does CBS think we're that stupid?

Does CBS think we're that stupid? 02/10/2004 02:42 AM

I'd like to someday live in a country where a quick nipple shown on TV isn't the end of civilization, and that's not what irks me about the halftime show tonight. What does get me about the Superbowl halftime show is CBS insisting it was an accident, calling it a "wardrobe malfunction."

It's funny, when you collect the evidence, I wonder if CBS really thinks the public is stupid enough to believe it:

1. It was planned from the start.
2. There are snaps on her outfit clearly visible, designed to be unsnapped. Most garments are sewn together sans snaps and don't fall apart.
3. She's wearing a "nipple shield" to partially cover her breast. If it was unplanned why on earth would she have this huge chunk of metal there? Was it to skirt some FCC rule against an entirely naked breast?
4. Worst of all: She has a single coming out which is coincidentally being rushed to the airwaves based on the "overwhelming worldwide demand." Check the timestamp on the bogus press release, it was posted before the game was even over.

Is it all a big coincidence or is this how controversy is manufactured to sell records these days?

It's the war, stupid

It's the war, stupid 05/27/2004 05:07 PM

Bio-stupid

Bio-stupid 08/02/2004 11:59 PM
Salon Aug 3 2004 4:08AM GMT

It's the IQ, stupid

It's the IQ, stupid 08/27/2004 01:51 PM
"Innate intelligence has to do with capability and ignorance to do with variables such as educational opportunity and personal diligence. But the conundrum remains. Is intellect important in presidents? If Americans can't solve the question definitively in the matter of John Kerry and George Bush, we damn sure ought to make an educated guess."

Stupid Web Tricks

Stupid Web Tricks 05/10/2004 07:16 AM
CNET May 10 2004 11:05AM GMT

It's the Dividend, Stupid!

It's the Dividend, Stupid! 04/30/2004 10:50 AM
Where has the magic gone?

stupid cupid

stupid cupid 02/12/2004 04:50 PM
I occasionally contribute to this fantastic online magazine called "The Cult of the One Eyed Cat." It's named after a real cat, who only has one eye, who once gave me half a look that chills me to this day.
This month's issue is all about Valentine's Day, so I wrote a snarky piece wherein I get frank about my true feelings for this annual tradition.
Here's a little bit to get you started:

Valentine's Day is upon us yet again, and husbands and boyfriends all over the country are trying to solve a fiendishly complex puzzle: what do we get our wives and girlfriends? If you're dating, are you dating long enough for roses? What if you're dating too long for roses? And what color? Should you get chocolates, because she's so sweet, or should you stay away from chocolates because she will freak about how it's going to make her fat?
The stakes are incredibly high. If we work out the Rube Goldberg machine that is the female psyche, we may just get that once-a-year blowjob . . . but if we fail to read the tea leaves correctly, we end up spending the evening alone in the bedroom with ESPN Classics while she watches Lifetime in the living room and talks on the phone with her bitter single friend who hates us.

You can read the rest of my story, and some other stories that are much better than mine, at The Cult of the One Eyed Cat

PREVIEW: It's the War, Stupid

PREVIEW: It's the War, Stupid 04/14/2004 06:22 AM
Larry Miller's message to President Bush .. PREVIEW: It's the War, Stupid .. latest

weeklystandard.com/Utilities/printer_preview.asp?idArticle=39 59&R=9DDC31DDD
track this site | 5 links

It's The Standard, Stupid

It's The Standard, Stupid 02/19/2004 06:04 PM
Ultimately it's not about the player. It's about the music you put on the player. By Christopher Breen (Macworld via MyAppleMenu)

It's the torrent, stupid

It's the torrent, stupid 12/22/2004 01:29 AM
Xeni Jardin: Mark Pesce rants about the recent shutdowns of BitTorrent supersites Suprnova.org and TorrentBits.com.

Hey, Hollywood! Can you feel the future slipping through your fingers? Do you understand how badly you've screwed up? You took a perfectly serviceable situation - a nice, centralized system for the distribution of media, and, through your own greed and shortsightedness, are giving birth to a system of digital distribution that you'll never, ever be able to defeat. In your avarice and arrogance you ignored the obvious: you should have cut a deal with SuprNova.org. In partnership you could have found a way to manage the disruptive change that's already well underway. Instead, you have repeated the mistakes made by the recording industry, chapter and verse. And thus you have spelled your own doom.

It's said that the best sequels are just like the original, only bigger and louder. Ladies and gentlemen, prepare yourselves for one hell of a crash. This baby is now fully out of control.

Link (via waxy)

Stupid PDF-only Policy

Stupid PDF-only Policy 01/28/2004 06:41 PM
he Consumer Federation of California just issued a privacy report that is full of useful information -- but it's available only as a large PDF file, not in HTML or RTF or plain text.

Its the War Economy, Stupid

Its the War Economy, Stupid 01/22/2004 02:11 AM
So Dean has lost Iowa, but he will get another chance to win that state. Jeff points to exit polls and says: Kerry has strong support among those who support the war. Ditto Edward and Gephardt. In short: The war...

When ad execs get stupid

When ad execs get stupid 09/13/2004 04:10 PM
ZDNet Sep 13 2004 7:53PM GMT

It's Your Stupid Boss

It's Your Stupid Boss 07/19/2004 03:18 PM

Direct and Related Links for 'It’s Your Stupid Boss'

“Refraining from opening e-mail attachments from unknown senders is the number one way companies can stop the spread of viruses and worms. But evidence from a survey by AT&T and the Economist Intelligence Unit (EUI) shows that 78 per cent of top-level employees surveyed, ranging from board members to CEOs and CIOs, plead guilty to double-clicking on unknown files. Ironically, this ‘Network Security: Managing the risk and opportunity’ survey, released Thursday, also showed that 92…

Ben Affleck's stupid Car

Ben Affleck's stupid Car 12/31/2003 11:59 PM
Ben Affleck taking their parking spaces .. More of Ben's expensive car

tommee.net/ben
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fat and stupid is no way to go through
life, son

fat and stupid is no way to go through
life, son 02/05/2005 09:02 PM
RIP, Dean Wormer

It's the Customer, Stupid!

It's the Customer, Stupid! 06/05/2005 10:54 PM
Best Buy expands in-store offerings for small-business customers.

"Well that was stupid, guess they
shouldn't just do it."

"Well that was stupid, guess they
shouldn't just do it." 03/26/2005 12:44 PM
A Child's View of the Army "....Like every other boy he was going through the little green army men phase....Gabe is roughly five years old and very articulate. Thus it should have come as little surprise when he began having one army man in charge, and the rest start building something. "Sir, we're ready to build the rocket." " : Five year old Gabe explains - via stacked creamers and table bricabrac, at an IHOP breakfast - the ramifications of mindless subservience to authority.

Stupid Banner Ads

Stupid Banner Ads 06/18/2004 03:56 PM
Stupid Internet Ads. From Scary Crayon. SHOOT TERRORIS T WIN IPOD.

It’s the Libraries, Stupid

It’s the Libraries, Stupid 06/09/2004 11:39 PM
Via Jeff Dillon, some insightful words on programming in Java and in the C#/.NET/Mono ecosystem. I hadn’t thought about it that way.

Stupid Fun Club

Stupid Fun Club 06/04/2004 01:14 AM
Software Development Magazine: Inside the Stupid Fun Club.

Software Development Magazine wrote an article called "Inside the Stupid Fun Club" (registration required).

The author, Alexandra Weber Morales, unexpectedly encountered the Sad Robot, broken down and crying for help on the streets of Oakland.

We were shooting a couple of hidden camera reality TV "One Minute Movies" for NBC: one of a Sad Robot torn apart into pieces and pleading for help from passers by, and the other of a Robot Waiter taking orders,  serving food and bantering for a tip in a barbecue restaurant.

I (Don Hopkins) developed the custom "robot brain" software for Will Wright's Stupid Fun Club, mostly in Python. It involved writing lots of high level Python code and XML data, and integrating all kinds of different software components together with SWIG, C++, ActiveX, Java, IRC, HTTP and WiFi. The robot features 3D facial animation, speech synthesis and recognition, conversational scripting, artificial intelligence, personality simulation, telerobotic remote control via wireless networking, with an interactive web interface for controling its behavior in real time.

For another Stupid Fun Club project, I also used Python to develop expressive synthetic speech authoring tools (audio speech “phonoscoping”, like visual animation “rotoscoping”), and talking toy simulations.

Python is ideally suited for brainstorming and prototyping new product ideas, as well as developing custom real-time robotic software for supporting creative Stupid Fun Club projects like reality TV production.

Eventually, Alexandra Weber Morales tracked down the person responsible, Will Wright, at his private production company, the Stupid Fun Club. She asked Will about the Sad Robot:
[I've added my own comments like this.
-Don]

Uh, OK. So, what kinds of reactions did people have to Sad Robot?

Wright: A lot of people were talking directly to it. Most of the women who were walking alone just sped up like they were spooked by it. Most of the single men would stop and start stripping it for parts, ignoring that the robot was talking to them. And it was mostly the couples who would actually interact with it and try to help it. Some would have long conversations, pushing the buttons.

We had a whole sort of troubleshooting thing, and we wanted to see how far people would go to help it. It was sort of a Good Samaritan experiment.

She also asked about the software we developed to control the robot, simulate its personality, animate its face, and listen and talk with people.

Have you heard of an AI knowledge base called Cyc?

Wright: For the conversational side of it, we’re using something similar to Cyc—in fact, we were looking at Cyc. There’s so many different layers. First of all, there’s the voice recognition, which is getting much better but is still pretty limited. Then, once you have the voice, you go into the conversation engine, and then it’s doing something like Cyc or Alice or Eliza: trying to give an appropriate response to what your input was. One of the projects we’re working on here is this toy design where we have these toys that converse with each other via infrared text-to-speech.

There are all these different approaches to AI. Some of them are more brute force, like Cyc. There’s also artificial life, an attempt to evolve systems rather than build them from the ground up.

Where’s this work being done?

Wright: The Santa Fe Institute is one place. There’s genetic programming, or adaptive systems, to give computers a way to learn and get feedback. That looks like a more promising approach.

Back in the ’60s, when computers were first being used in business, everybody assumed we’d have artificial intelligence in 10 years. When 2001 came out, in 1967, and people came out of that movie saying, “I can’t believe that a computer will be able to play chess that well.” But they took the conversation with HAL for granted. In fact, it was the opposite: Chess turned out to be the easy part; natural conversation turned out to be the hard part. Within 20 years, we’re going to have machines like this that have full autonomy and pretty good conversational ability. We could build a stove that would have a long conversation with you. So the real interesting question for me now is, what’s going to happen when our world is surrounding us with intelligent machines? These are going to be the first aliens we meet.

Describe the software running this thing.

Wright: The conversational chatbot is Alice. It takes input and you give it a dictionary to define what it knows about.

[ALICE is written in Java, so Python talks to it through an IRC server running on the robot. We can connect to the same IRC channel over the wireless network, watch the messages going between ALICE and the brain, interject text to speak and think, switch moods, play facial animations, tweak the personality, execute commands, etc. Later I developed a more powerful web based " Homunculus" interface, for operating the robot in real time, with a web browser on a remote laptop or handheld.
-Don]

Winter: That’s connected to Microsoft speech recognition, which is fantastic.

[I wouldn't go that far. It doesn't suck, but "fantastic" is a stretch. 
-Don]

Winter: And some simple AI, since Alice may or may not understand what you’re talking about.

[In other words, Alice is like the mad old aunt with Tourette's Syndrome you keep locked away in the attic. Alice is only used as a backstop, when the Python/XML/AI layer of the robot brain can't think of anything to say. But it's turned off when we don't want the robot to seem insane.
-Don]

Winter: The most intelligent thing it ever did is we had an opera singer in here singing to the robot, but the robot didn’t like it. So she said, “maybe I should explain the story,” and after the singer finished, the robot paraphrased the whole thing back to her. It was about the most amazing thing we’d ever seen; we all just about started believing in robots at that moment.

[What's really interesting is abusing the speech recognizer, by putting the robot brain into a mode where it listens to itself (and anyone else) talk! It's like the mutating telephone gossip game, or the news media echo chamber: The robot repeats what it thinks it heard itself say, which it then mis-recognizes and distorts again and again, in a feedback loop of quasi-coherent rhyming speech! Any words you interject get mixed in and distorted in the speech recognition/synthesis feedback loop. It naturally finds and converges on extremely strange attractors in the recognizer's hidden markov models of the English language, chanting and mutating gramatically plausible but semantically ridiculous phrases, in response to whatever it thinks it hears. When properly configured, the robot can actually compose live performances of original surrealistic beat robopoetry, responding to the audience in real time! Stanislaw Lem calls that "Bitic Literature".
-Don]

Winter: When we take these in public, it seems like the people who are less technical savvy are the ones who interact with it, whereas the people with technical backgrounds are standing there reverse-engineering it.

Are you following what MIT has done with humanoid robots such as Kismet?

Wright: There are lots of research labs around the country building these types of robots, but they never take them out into the public. We drive them into a laundromat or a restaurant and see what the response is.

When we filmed Sad Robot, we also filmed a scene in a restaurant with a robot waiter. It was interesting how many people totally bought it. Usually within three or four minutes, they were completely normal about it. People kind of expect that there will be robots in the future; it’s just a matter of when.

[The Sad Robot: A pitiful broken down female robot is crying for help, bent out of shape and fallen on its side with a mangled tractor tread, next to a stinky garbage dumpster, begging reluctant passers by to turn it upright, describe its condition, press its big red reset button, adjust its controls, step away before it explodes, and call a mysterious professor on their cell phone.
The Robot Waiter: An earnest robot waiter, just trying to do its job taking orders, delivering food to tables, telling jokes and bantering for tips, and collecting dirty dishes. Afterwards submits itself to a Robot Waiter Performance Evaluation Survey, and begs the human to give it good marks, otherwise it might lose its job.
-Don]

Robot: If you could have any kind of robot, what would it be? The goal is elimination of crime, combined with rehabilitation of criminals … Yes, it seems very long to me, too.

What do you use for automated testing?

Wright: Our own suites. Most of our stuff is in C++, but we have a proprietary visual scripting language I designed, called Edith, for the behavioral code for the Sims. It’s totally geared to AI and the Sims.

[The robot software is written in C++, Python and XML. Edith is used to program simulated personalities, but for simulated people instead of real robots. Edith is the tool for programming The Sims, for scripting the artificial intelligence of the characters and objects. The Sims visual programming language itself is called SimAntics. Edith is Maxis's official tool for programming SimAntics code, while iffpencil2 is another third party SimAntics programming tool, developed outside of Maxis.
-Don]

Winter: I think it’s time for the Christmas robot.

Wright: Are you running that … weapon? I don’t know if we want to sit here. [A dancing snowman on a wheeled platform with a circular saw mounted on its front bumper approaches a plastic toy-store robot.]

Winter: No, you would die. You’d better take cover.

[The interview ends.]

The snowman quickly demolishes the toy, shooting debris throughout the warehouse. With Winter’s encouragement, I spend 10 minutes in a nonsensical conversation with the robot. He also shows me the Minute Movie that have been made for NBC—and they’re hilarious.

I leave this unconventional interview impressed with the way the Stupid Fun Club has turned a fascination with robots and toys into a lucrative and wholly entertaining enterprise. Meanwhile, the larger concerns about the technical strengths, limitations and implications of these semiautonomous machines go mostly unanswered. Wright and Winter seem firmly on the side of presentation, and somewhat unwilling to delve deeply into how their toys work—as if to say, “Where’s the fun in asking all these questions? Just talk to the robot.”

I'm certainly interested in delving deeply into how the robot brain works myself, but not everyone else is. So I used Python to develop a high-level XML based AI and wireless web remote control system, which enables creative writers and designers like Will Wright to script and control the robot behavior, and reconfigure it for different scenarios, without needing to deal with Python, C++ or the other software components that went into building it.

[Don Hopkins' RadiOMatic BlogUTron]

It's the work, stupid

It's the work, stupid 06/02/2004 12:53 AM

Doc chimes back.....

Digital codestyle aggregation < STRONG>

Two datapoints, perhaps historical.

First, Sun apparently decides that the revenue model to beat (since charging for hardware and software seem to be losing propositions) is selling services. Bill Snyder (from that last link):

Stripped of the marketing hype, Sun hopes to sell services, rather than simply pushing hardware and software at its customers, and have them pay as they use those services.

Second, Marc Canter's latest rap: Ho w to make money with digital lifestyle aggregators - Part I. Excerpts:

Aggregation is a killer app - that no one owns. It's public domain. Everyone benefits from it. So is integration as well...

To start to reap the benefits of digital lifestyle aggregation - you need to get smart about architecting systems that rely upon XML, open standards and web services.

So personalization and customization find their destiny intermixed with Integration and Aggregation. The only way to produce compelling enough experiences is by integrating a wide range of built-in constructs, combining that with agregated web servcies and content and topping it all off with unprecedented levels of control and customization. In one product or service.

All three of these tenets are tatooed on my forhead.

----

OK so wait. This post was supposed to be about 'making money' - and you're lost. Right?

Well think about it - you couldn't possibly (on your own) produce even half of the built-in constructs, features and capabilities we're saying digital lifestyle aggreation (DLAs) requires. That's where open source comes in.

By supporting and contributing to open source projects - portal vendors will actually be able to have their cake and eat it too - proprietary solutions, branded memes and viral uptake. Just give open source a try - define it to your own requirements and insights and help out the world while you're helping yourself.

I think he's saying "sell your environment," no? Not clear.

In anycase, it's not about selling. It's about renting. You rent your domain names, your Net access, your disposable hardware. Stop and think about that last one for a bit. Your personal data — the stuff on your laptop's hard drive — may change constantly, but it's your life in a box. And it moves every two or three years (if not more often) from one laptop or desktop or removable drive or remote host to another. What you pay for a new box almost amounts to a revolving charge, an annuity. Rent.

So you charge on a project basis to build stuff, then you rent out your space or your services. Oldest models in the world.

Welcome to the land of deflated but sustainable margins. Also the land of the finally grown-up computer business. (When it gets there, which it isn't yet.)

Look at it this way: It's the work, stupid. A new slogan I'm trying on for size. Serves in architecture, design, construction, and a pile of other fields from which the computer biz borrows its lingo. Why not here too? [D oc Searls]

Marc's add-on.....

This is getting fun.

Having folks like Doc add their two cents to this is like collaboratively writing a business plan...

a) As usual I learn more from Doc by just listening.  I don't necessarily see it as "sell your environment" as much as "give away compelling experiences - that if they're done right - will have PLENTY of good old fashioned advanced features that people will pay for.  Only folks who appreciate and can gain value from software should have to pay for it.  Every vendor has to figure out the seam between free and paid (as 6A just did.)

b) One thing about this rental angle that Doc adds in - is that you're also renting access to a community of others just like you - doing the same thing.  That's what's cool about the AlwaysOn Network right now.  There are otehrs blogging about teh same stuff and collectively we present a group voice.  Lots of other examples of this sort of juju out there.  Now there's one that tightly coupled to a social network -as well.  Again putting things into context (which is what danah has been screaming for......)

c) Finally - Doc reminds us all that the REAL savings is not in less licesning fees, but in self support.  How much IT money is spent on training, support, and migration?  What if everyone could support each other?  I mean - Oh My God!  All this AND I get to be called a leader in the Open Source Widget business?

Why wouldn't  portal jump on board?  I just hope Terry Semel, Ruppert Murdoch and Richard Branson grok this. I think Barry Diller does.

Stupid titles

Stupid titles 03/19/2003 10:27 PM
I'm honestly worn out today. Apparently there is an assembily that will be taking place at our school on Friday....

Being Stupid and Homophobic

Being Stupid and Homophobic 06/21/2004 01:05 AM

Joi Ito calls Ray Bradbury's complaint about Michael Moore's movie Fahrenheit 9/11 stupid and compared it to a supposedly homophobic essay by Orson Scott Card.

Don't you hate it when your favorite writers do, write or say stupid things?

This reminds me of the horror of reading Orson Scott Card's homophobic essay, "Homose xual "Marriage" and Civilization".

The following is an edited version of my comment:

I think Bradbury's position is understandable and definitely not stupid. Don't you think the proper thing for Michael Moore to do was to ask? If Bradbury was pro-Bush, he wouldn't have wanted the title of his works being used for Michael Moore's movie. For him to just blatently use the title like that is just plain asinine.

As to your comment about Orson Scott Card being homophobic, I don't see what is wrong with being homophobic. If there is nothing stupid about being afraid of heights or spiders, why is being homophobic stupid?

Stupid Movies

Stupid Movies 05/28/2004 09:35 AM

I'm glad to see that "The Day After Tomorrow" -- a disaster movie about climate change -- is getting bad reviews. Much of science in this picture, by almost every account, is ludicrous. There's almost no doubt that we're heading toward serious global consequences due to our prolificacy in the use of energy and other things that affect climate, but stupid movies shouldn't be moving the discussion in either direction. And when otherwise reputable people and organizations like Al Gore and Moveon.org use the movie to leverage their own concerns, they don't enhance their own reputations. The notion that global warming could set off an ice age is not stupid, however idiotically and unrealistically the movie portrays such an event. Scientists have offered persuasive evidence that such a thing is at least thinkable. And there's widespread consensus among scientists about global warming itself. I'll probably watch this movie when it hits the cable channels. I won't imagine, however, that it's about much of anything serious.

It's the googleware, stupid!

It's the googleware, stupid! 11/11/2003 03:22 PM
It's never good to leave things hanging (nor, I suppose, is it that great an idea to link to yourself) so I did the sensible thing--empirical testing. Threw up a new image, mentioned it on IRC, and a few folks went to look. No googlebot. Dowloaded Opera and installed it, telling it that I was OK with google's adware/spyware stuff. Threw up another image, and looked at it with the new install of opera, which I then shut down and haven't fired up since. The result? Five minutes and 38 seconds after my look at the image, here comes googlebot!...

Stupid rain

Stupid rain 05/24/2004 12:32 PM
Why is it everytime I make plans with someone, the goddamn weather gets in the way?!?! Even my mother said...

All the stupid people. Where do they all
come from?

All the stupid people. Where do they all
come from? 11/03/2003 11:13 AM
Opinion Campaign to Re-Educate the Public

Stupid Credit Tricks

Stupid Credit Tricks 06/29/2004 03:33 PM
Watch your wallet. It's not just the bad guys out to get you.

Lemurs aren't so stupid after all
(Reuters)

Lemurs aren't so stupid after all
(Reuters) 05/12/2004 05:24 PM
Reuters - Lemurs, once believed to be cute but basically stupid, show startling intelligence when given a chance to win treats by playing a computer game, U.S. researchers say.

Stupid Laptop Tricks

Stupid Laptop Tricks 04/10/2005 12:47 PM

In advance response to those who would misread the title to this article, it's the tricks that are stupid, not the laptop!

I just started a new job this week heading up the graphics department of a small printing company. I had become accustomed to having a laptop at my disposal at my old job — an aging 500MHz PowerBook G4 — so my new employer sweetened his offer to lure me to the new job with the promise of a spiffy new PowerBook. The new one runs at 1.5GHz, and while the speed difference is impressive and reason enough to not look back after the upgrade, some of the other features, like the automatic screen dimming, lighted keyboard, Combo drive, standard BlueTooth and AirPort, etc... are pretty cool too.

One of the things the guy at the Mac shop mentioned when he was showing it to me was the "Sudden Motion Sensor" feature, which uses several sensors in the case to detect sudden changes in position, and will park the hard drive heads to keep them from crashing into the drive platters. I hope I'll never need that feature, and really didn't think much about it, but of course some people just aren't able to leave a feature like that alone. Amit Singh has figured out how to gather data generated by those sensors...

While the PowerBook only uses the AMS as a defensive measure to prevent accidental damage to the disk drive, such sensors could have a variety of uses. In particular, they have been considered an alternative input methods in user interfaces for video game controllers, phones, PDAs, and other mobile devices. While it is to be seen if they will be successful in these areas, such use at least has a novelty value

He's even built a couple of silly little apps that make use of the sensors.

AMSV isualizer A graphical application that displays a 3-D picture of a PowerBook. The picture's orientation is a real-time approximation of the PowerBook's physical orientation. Thus, the on-screen picture moves with the movement of the AMS-equipped PowerBook.

Stable Window A graphical application that creates a window displaying a bicycle wheel. The window is "stable" in the sense that if you rotate the AMS-equipped PowerBook left or right, the window compensates by rotating itself by an equal amount in the opposite direction.

Running StableWindow is the wierdest thing; a window's edges are just supposed to be aligned with the edges of the screen; seeing something other than that is just... wierd. But some of the... um... "practical" applications for this sound kinda fun. I catch no end of grief from my wife & kids about using body english when I'm playing FA-18 Hornet on the desktop machine at home; how cool would it be for those body movements to actually control the simulator! Then I could truthfully tell them that leaning in my chair actually does help!

via AppleFritter.

Stupid Broken Wintel

Stupid Broken Wintel 07/19/2004 09:36 PM
Lauren is going on a trip in a few days, and we thought that free videophoning would be nice to have while she’s on the road. She’s got a decent IBM Thinkpad X31 which has FireWire, and AIM is supposed to work with iChat A/V, so this should be possible. You can’t plug an iSight into Windows, so she got an “iBot” FireWire cam from Orange Micro. The Thinkpad has a FireWire port, but it’s a passive four-wire that doesn’t provide power, so she had to get a powered hub (this is already too much work). Then she fired up AIM and... no luck, it didn’t recognize the iBot; it did, however, let us audio chat back and forth. Windows XP saw the camera just fine and you could see the video. So we checked the iBot with the Mac, it worked perfectly with iChat. First, she spent some time on the Web Site; no help, but there was a phone number. She called it, pressed the number for tech support and a recording said “for tech support send email to support@.” So she sent the email and got back an auto-responder saying “for tech support go to the Website.” So she tried it with Yahoo Messenger, and it worked in webcam mode, incredibly slow, but then there was no audio chat. So we plugged in our big hand-held videocam and it also didn’t get recognized by AIM. So I’m not sure whether IBM sucks or XP sucks or AIM sucks or the iBot sucks. But it’s the iBot that’s going back to the store tomorrow. (Lauren would happily get a PowerBook except for, like a high proportion of the female population, she has sensitive fingertips and finds a touchpad massively unpleasant. Earth to Apple...) Sometimes I hate computers.

"Stupid Evil Bastard"

"Stupid Evil Bastard" 03/29/2005 11:44 PM

Stupid Criticisms of Fahrenheit 9/11

Stupid Criticisms of Fahrenheit 9/11 07/01/2004 03:38 PM
In Fahrenheit 9/11 Michael Moore has made a moving and powerful film whcich shows things most Americans have not seen…

"Why does Bush sound stupid?"

"Why does Bush sound stupid?" 09/14/2004 10:40 AM
George W. Bush's "Bushisms" -- the mangled phrases that result from his torture of the English language -- cement his political adversaries' opinions of his inadequacy and leave his supporters appreciative of how "average" he can be. But Alex Beam's column today in the Boston Globe examines the option that Bush isn't just a "plain talker," but a sufferer of "presenile dementia."

Stupid Finnish poetry

Stupid Finnish poetry 03/06/2004 02:03 AM

Apologies to my foreign readers. It would be worse in English, trust me :-). I just had to put this one in the form of a tanka poem. I have no explanation.

"They like Bush, and they are not stupid
- www.theage.com.au"

"They like Bush, and they are not stupid
- www.theage.com.au" 01/22/2004 02:49 AM

Grok Description matches for Verizon Says Don't Be Stupid
GrokA matches for Verizon Says Don't Be Stupid

Motorola V265 / V260 announced

Motorola V265 / V260 announced 06/08/2004 10:00 PM
MobileTracker Jun 9 2004 1:30AM GMT

Unlocking Verizon V265 phones

Unlocking Verizon V265 phones 02/05/2005 10:00 PM
Ben Wilson: Now, here's the rub... (There is always a rub). Verizon had locked down these phones so damned tight! You couldn't get your photos off of your phone unless you paid Verizon $0.25 to send them via email from your phone. And if you wanted to transfer a background image to your phone, you had to go the same route. You can't upload games or ringtones or any of the things that you might expect a futurephone such as this would allow. Verizon has that locked down and would like to sucker you at $0.25 a pop. Me, being the meddling user/client/customer that I am did a little research ...

Motorola, Inc: Motorola Reaches Cable
Modem Milestone in EMEA

Motorola, Inc: Motorola Reaches Cable
Modem Milestone in EMEA 09/08/2004 05:05 AM
UK Wire Sep 8 2004 9:29AM GMT

Verizon Wireless and Motorola announced
the Motorola V710 wireless phone

Verizon Wireless and Motorola announced
the Motorola V710 wireless phone 08/13/2004 02:16 PM
Wi-Fi Technology Forum Aug 13 2004 5:59PM GMT

Motorola and Verizon Wireless Announce
the Upcoming Debut of the Eagerly
Awaited Motorola V710

Motorola and Verizon Wireless Announce
the Upcoming Debut of the Eagerly
Awaited Motorola V710 07/20/2004 09:19 PM
PhysOrg.com Jul 21 2004 1:02AM GMT

Motorola to Offer Camera Phone at
Verizon Wireless (Reuters)

Motorola to Offer Camera Phone at
Verizon Wireless (Reuters) 07/20/2004 12:57 PM
Reuters - Verizon Wireless, the largest U.S. wireless operator, will finally offer a camera phone from Motorola Inc. (MOT.N) this summer after delays caused the cell-phone maker to miss last year's critical holiday season, the companies said on Tuesday.

Other News: Cable Modem Hacking

Other News: Cable Modem Hacking 02/10/2004 02:42 AM
And here's what's going on with cable modem hacking....

Switched to Verizon and the Motorola
V710 Phone

Switched to Verizon and the Motorola
V710 Phone 08/13/2004 12:33 PM
As previously threatened, I've switched to Verizon and picked up a Motorola V710 yesterday. They just arrived on Wednesday, so I'm one of the first few folks to get one (at least from my local Verizon Wireless store). To recap, my reasons for switching are twofold: I wanted to get onto Verizon for the superior coverage. I wanted a Bluetooth phone. The V710 is Verizon's one and only Bluetooth phone. So far, all I can say is that it's...

Verizon Wireless launches Motorola V710

Verizon Wireless launches Motorola V710 08/12/2004 08:47 PM
MobileTracker Aug 12 2004 11:48PM GMT

Verizon Wireless, Motorola Sign Pact

Verizon Wireless, Motorola Sign Pact 07/26/2004 03:58 PM
Forbes Jul 26 2004 7:53PM GMT

Verizon Wireless gets Motorola V710
exclusive

Verizon Wireless gets Motorola V710
exclusive 08/16/2004 08:11 PM
infoSync Aug 16 2004 10:16PM GMT

Verizon Wireless and Motorola Sign
Agreement for Network Expansion

Verizon Wireless and Motorola Sign
Agreement for Network Expansion 07/27/2004 11:11 AM
Wi-Fi Technology Forum Jul 27 2004 3:00PM GMT

Verizon, Motorola Expand

Verizon, Motorola Expand 07/26/2004 03:58 PM
Unstrung.com Jul 26 2004 8:15PM GMT

Motorola V710 available from Verizon
next week

Motorola V710 available from Verizon
next week 08/04/2004 06:18 AM
Engadget Aug 4 2004 9:42AM GMT

More Verizon/Motorola V710 Details

More Verizon/Motorola V710 Details 07/29/2004 11:30 AM

So we knew Motorola's new V710 was going to be hitting Verizon Wireless sometime in August, but internal documents reveal the exact date will be the 11th (and by internal documents I mean a PDF on their site, so peruse away.) Pricing looks about standard for a phone in this range: $420 at full retail; as low as $320 subsidized with a two-year contract.

The most interesting information, though, are the three listed Bluetooth Accessories, a headset ($80), a car kit ($200 ouch!), and an external speaker ($100). While their function is pretty much self-explanatory, what they don't address is that niggling rumor that the V710 somehow uses a non-standard Bluetooth implementation (which would mean other, less-expensive third-party peripherals wouldn't work). I guess we'll have to wait until someone gets their hands on one to confirm. (Thanks, Barry!)

Read - V710 Equipment Guide (PDF) [VerizonWireless]

Related
Verizon Announces Motorola V710; In Stores August [Gizmodo]

Verizon Announces Motorola V710; In
Stores August

Verizon Announces Motorola V710; In
Stores August 07/20/2004 11:05 AM

Verizon has announced the highly-anticipated Motorola V710 -- a 1.23-megapixel and Bluetooth clamshell phone -- is now shipping and should be available nationwide by August. I know it doesn't make sense that Verizon has gotten a hot phone before other carriers, let alone get a hot phone and sell it for around $250 (after rebates and contracts, natch), but these are the strange days we live in.

Word on the street, though, is that the Bluetooth connectivity is crippled and can only be used with a few wireless earpieces and Verizon Wireless's proprietary syncing software. Now that sounds more like the Verizon we know. (Thanks, Aaron!)
Read - Press Release [Gizmodo]

Related
What's In Your Gadget Bag, Xeni? [Gizmodo]

Verizon Crippled Bluetooth Features in
Motorola V710

Verizon Crippled Bluetooth Features in
Motorola V710 09/02/2004 03:56 PM

Cable Modem Hackers unlock Cable Modem

Cable Modem Hackers unlock Cable Modem 02/10/2004 02:44 AM
A very amazing article on the Register on how a group of hackers have unlocked a certain brand of cable...

RCA / Thomson Modem Hack Discovered

RCA / Thomson Modem Hack Discovered 12/27/2004 12:43 PM

Motorola Announces the Motorola i710
Mobile Phone

Motorola Announces the Motorola i710
Mobile Phone 07/08/2004 02:12 PM
Linux Electrons Jul 8 2004 6:24PM GMT

Motorola Introduces Motorola V557,
Motorola V360 and Motorola V176

Motorola Introduces Motorola V557,
Motorola V360 and Motorola V176 03/14/2005 06:27 PM
SlashPhone Mar 11 2005 12:23PM GMT

Diva: Not just a cell phone but a modem,
too

Diva: Not just a cell phone but a modem,
too 08/03/2004 09:22 PM
ZDNet Aug 4 2004 0:31AM GMT

Motorola Announces the Motorola CN620,
Dual-Network Wi-Fi Phone

Motorola Announces the Motorola CN620,
Dual-Network Wi-Fi Phone 07/27/2004 04:22 AM
Wi-Fi Technology Forum Jul 27 2004 8:22AM GMT

Motorola and Apple Bring iTunes Music
Player to Motorola’s
Next-Generation Mobile Phones

Motorola and Apple Bring iTunes Music
Player to Motorola’s
Next-Generation Mobile Phones 07/28/2004 04:32 PM

SMC�s Wireless Cable Modem Router Among
First to Receive CableHome 1.1
Certification

SMC�s Wireless Cable Modem Router Among
First to Receive CableHome 1.1
Certification 05/31/2004 02:06 PM
SMC� Networks EZ Connect� Wireless Cable Modem Router, SMC8013WG, has received CableHome� 1.1 certification from CableLabs�. [PRWEB May 27, 2004]

Man charged with hacking Verizon

Man charged with hacking Verizon 07/15/2004 11:45 AM
Computer Weekly Jul 15 2004 3:38PM GMT

New York man indicted for hacking into
Verizon computers

New York man indicted for hacking into
Verizon computers 07/13/2004 05:08 PM
The indictment alleges that an East Chester, N.Y., broke into Verizon's telephone system at least 100 times earlier this year.

Verizon Wireless Rolls Network Crews,
Mobile Cell Sites in Wake of Hurricane
Frances

Verizon Wireless Rolls Network Crews,
Mobile Cell Sites in Wake of Hurricane
Frances 09/05/2004 08:21 PM
Investors Business Daily Sep 6 2004 0:21AM GMT

Proxicast Adds Support For Verizon
Wireless� DMU / MIP / Static IP To Its
LAN-Cell Mobile Gateway Cellular Router

Proxicast Adds Support For Verizon
Wireless� DMU / MIP / Static IP To Its
LAN-Cell Mobile Gateway Cellular Router 03/14/2005 04:44 PM
New CDMA-based LAN-Cell Model Eases Deployment of Remote Monitoring, Telemetry, SCADA, Data Collection and Other Cellular Applications [PRWEB Mar 14, 2005]

What's A Cable Modem, And Who Decides?

What's A Cable Modem, And Who Decides? 03/28/2005 12:56 PM
Forbes Mar 28 2005 5:22PM GMT

Verizon Says Don't Be Stupid

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