November 13th, 2007, posted in Uncategorized
So I was watching some of the clever new ads that Apple has out here: Apple – Get a Mac – Watch The TV Ads, and I am struck once again how similar Apple is to M$ in it’s evil ways. We recently bought a new imac, we love it in most ways (except iphoto seems to hate us and we have to force quite it regularly), but what I see about apple is that they do all the same crap that M$ does but they just do it with a hell of a lot more style than M$.
Back to my apple TV ads example, so after watching several ads I click on the next ad and it says that “watching ads requires Quicktime 7.” Hmmmmm really? It seems to me I was just watching several of them without any difficulties, and now I need to upgrade? (I was on my Dell laptop when this happened) Sounds like the same kind of crap that M$ pulls all the time by breaking functionality of some competitor pages in IE and making it hard for some companies to integrate their products with M$ products.
Some people complain about the M$ continual upgrades, Apple does the same thing, if not more often (iLife 07 & 08), and Apple is integrating some features from Leopard more tightly with .mac, which will suck another $99/year out of your pocket.
Apple just has a hell of a lot more style and is more focused on making a great experience for users and has some good interaction design, but they’re both out to control our lives and suck tons of money out of our pockets. They both do this by tightly integrating products and OS tying us to them forever with little chance of escaping. Oh and let’s just go ahead and add Google too, ’cause I can NEVER get rid of my gmail account. Where else can I store all my emails and have them searchable, and who else offers a web mail app that supports the kinds of rules that filters offer in gmail? Take gmail+browser sync+personal search and I may never be able to escape Google, but at this point I don’t want to, I’m happily sucked into their promises and superior products, just as I am starting to be with Apple.
Maybe what I’m actually talking about is the fact that increasingly larger portions of my life are spent online and in computer systems and are recorded in thousands of places. I no longer own me or my life to a large extent and there is a part of me that worries about that, and for the priviledge of doing that I need to shell out money for lots of things, my computer, my software, and my services (ISP, web hosting, and many others).
November 2nd, 2007, posted in Uncategorized
When you get a notification from a facebook app, they usually are deceitful. Sorry to those developers that aren’t jerks, but it seems that many of you are.
Here’s a screen cap from my gmail account:
Sorry I had to thumbnail it, please do click on it to actually see it, otherwise it would break my column, which I hate!
What it seems to be saying is that I have a funwall and my friend posted on it.
BUT I DON’T HAVE A FUN WALL, and I don’t want a fun wall, and I don’t think I need one either.
This is actually a request for me to add the application.
Even if my friend did use her fun wall to send something to me, it should allow me to see that without adding the application. It’s really stupid, and it makes me mad, and not only that it makes me want to use facebook less.
Anyone else feel this way?
November 1st, 2007, posted in Grad School
Well it’s official, I’m the at-large member of the executive committee for the graduate informatics student association. The at large member is the person who takes on the stuff that doesn’t fit into the other committees, helps get students’ needs heard, and serves as an alternate point of contact for the organization when the executive chair isn’t available. What that means for those of you who are graduate students in the dept of Informatics is that I am here to serve you. Please email, IM, or call me if you have a concern about school. I would also encourage you to get involved with GISA or one of the other organizations on campus and get your voice heard! All too often we complain about something, wish something were different, but think it’s not that important. If you care about it enough, chances are something can be done about it. Just this week I met with Michael McRobbie, President of IU. I brought him my concerns about student health care, and about game studies AKA ludology. I believe that my concerns were heard, and even though it is not yet significant, actions are being taken, and that if I’m persistent real change will happen.
Flickr /blueron48
The other thing I can’t resist writing about today is Fall. It’s the first of November, you can feel it in the air. Here in Indiana the leaves are changing, and of course falling. There is a crackle when you walk the sidewalks, and frost on the still-green grass in the mornings. I love this time of year… bright warmish afternoons when you wish you didn’t have your coat that you needed in the morning when you left home. Something is happening in the world, change is coming, not just in the seasons. What will life bring you in the last 61 days of 2007? Good things I hope!
