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  • Eddie A. Tejeda 11:23 am on October 30, 2006 Permalink | Reply  

    Message Archive 

    this audience is old
    forget the milk
    can you pick up milk? i’ll pay you back
    we’ll rendezvous another time?
    weekend was decent – can’t hang out this weekend can i’ll be in la
    how was the rest of your weekend?
    just kidding!
    that’s going to cost $
    go in main entrance and turn left
    hey.. i think i’ll stay in, i am tired.. but going to digitallife tom. if you’re interested. we’ll talk about this upstate thing next weekend too.
    he said to call
    yo
    just leaving work
    congrats uncle army
    babies! babies! babies! wahoo!
    hey, are you around?
    happy battlestar premiere to you
    you said to wake you up
    did the phone arrive yet?
    are you in america?
    have a good flight
    the bbq is from 5pm. if you any questions please call me
    107 norfork between delancy and rivington. call me when you get here. i’ll pay for you two’s door
    hey, i am joining around 8
    still going?
    mother courage – still on for tomorrow? call me..
    hey bro. lets keep in touch about chillin this weekend. hope the couch treated you well
    sweet

     

    • Dylan 9:27 pm on October 30, 2006 Permalink

      This is reminiscent to that “Life Stories” thing you showed us earlier.

  • Eddie A. Tejeda 9:42 pm on October 25, 2006 Permalink | Reply  

    Developing… 

    Activity on my blog and my company website has been light recently. This means one of two things: I’ve abandoned both projects or I’ve not had time to update either. I am glad to report that it is the latter scenario.

    Visudo has hired two new developers to help develop and launch our open source content management system (with a twist) called Smartest. We’ve been hesitating in releasing it for sometime now, but we want to have a few more private deployments before it goes out to the public to ensure it is something we’re satisfied with.

    I’ve also been contributing to the Institute for the Future of the Book on a few very interesting projects. One of which is going live fairly soon, called Media Commons.

    Our company website is also going through an overhaul (not a complete overhaul, but fairly drastic), which will definitely take time to polish.

    My business partner and great friend, Marcus, are also planning on merging our blogs together and focusing it a bit more. This will take some time for us to figure out.

    Things will be slow for some time, but I think the upcoming changes will be important.

     

  • Eddie A. Tejeda 4:31 pm on October 8, 2006 Permalink | Reply  

    Interesting Spam 

    This is interesting spam:

    want to see how you want to learn the support in your own code. you have. You know support in your own code. more complex. and why everything

    Singleton isn’t as simple as it design problems challenging. Something You want to learn the to do instead). You want will load patterns into your is so often misunderstood,
    you get to take so you look to Design In a way that makes you applications. You design problems

    your time is too important be wrong (and what when to use them, how the next time you’re be wrong (and what your boss told you
    better at solving software
    it struggling with academic you have. You know Design Patterns, you’ll avoid at speaking the language learned by those

    same problems. real OO design principles when he casually mentions In their native your boss told you You want to learn about
    your time on…something who’ve faced the of Design Patterns so brain in a way that sticks.
    Something more fun. how patterns are
    same problems.

    look “in the wild”.

    somewhere in the world and experience of others, same problems. when to use them, how
    a design paddle pattern. more complex.
    same problems.

    want to see how

    the patterns that or on the real relationship Most importantly, more complex.
    sounds, how the Factory environment. In other
    learned by those

    You want to learn about

    when to use them, how NOT to use them). to do instead). You want Decorator is something from
    your boss told you But you don’t just to do instead). You want
    challenging. Something (and too short) to spend With Design Patterns,

    You want to learn about you don’t want to texts. If you’ve read a Most importantly, to do instead). You want With Design Patterns, what to expect–a visually-rich
    somewhere in the world
    With Design Patterns, used in the Java API
    You want to learn about
    real OO design principles your time is too important
    want to see how

    You’re not what to expect–a visually-rich With Design Patterns, someone struggles environment. In other
    at speaking the language matter–why to use them, to do instead). You want Singleton isn’t as simple as it
    will load patterns into your Decorator is something from You’ll easily counter with your to know how they used in the Java API
    same problems.
    it struggling with academic
    to do instead). You want will load patterns into your (or worse, a flat tire), Facade, Proxy, and Factory challenging. Something

    Most importantly, to do instead). You want Head First book, you know

    the latest research in challenging. Something
    patterns look in challenging. Something deep understanding of why same problems.
    when he casually mentions his stunningly clever use of Command,
    Java’s built-in pattern

    You’ll easily counter with your

    It looks like they are using words from a project of mine, PHP-Controller, and since it does not have any links, it also appears like this is an email that is designed to slip by, or train my email filters to accept emails with this type of content.

     

  • Eddie A. Tejeda 5:37 pm on August 1, 2006 Permalink | Reply  

    Internet Sitcoms: sitdotcoms 

    Since i’ve been interested the development of online sitcoms, I plan to build a catalog of these shows to see how they progress. What I find interesting is that many of these online shows have a very distinct feel and pacing to them that is uncommon on traditional sitcoms. They also tend to be self-aware and absurd. I wonder why that is so. Is it simply because of budget? The lack of concern for commercial breaks? Or is this the kind of humor that works online? Anyway, this will be just a list, not necessarily a list of shows I like. Hopefully someone will find something they like.

    In delicious I made a new tag called sitdotcom to distinguish from all other types of sitcoms and online videos.

     

    • Dylan 8:15 am on August 2, 2006 Permalink

      I totally agree, and I see that, as well.

      I think the humor is different because the demographic of people who are watching the sitdotcom is way different – the average American sitcom (Friends, Will and Grace, Just Shoot Me, etc. etc.) are very similar.

      The budget is different so the show can afford to be funnier at a possible financial risk.

  • Eddie A. Tejeda 1:16 am on June 28, 2006 Permalink | Reply  

    Long live Wikipedia 

    The New York Times had an article called “Growing Wikipedia Revises Its ‘Anyone Can Edit’ Policy“, which I found fairly interesting, but was bothered by some of the quotes I read, especially those of Nicholas Carr.

    Ideals always expire in clotted, bureaucratic prose. It distances the killer from the killing.
    –Nicholas Carr

    Poetic, but has little to do with reality. Wikipedia is not perfect, but I think it’s a bit premature to start claiming the death of the project and it’s supposed abandoned principles, because of the way it’s organizing itself. Wikipedia has had to adapt to very challenging problems and the fact that Wikipedia has become what it is today, is a testament of good leadership, and not lack of ideals. It’s core philosophy has not been abandoned. If anything, it’s principles have been reenforced by it’s adaptability and commitment to collecting human knowledge.

    We began with no (or few) policies in particular and said that the community would determine—through a sort of vague consensus, based on its experience working together—what the policies would be.
    –Larry Sanger

    Like a Wiki, the governance has been flexible from the beginning. We have to remember not to project what we think are the ideals of Wikipedia. A rigid model that does not adapt is certainly destined for failure.

    While the Wikipedia brand and domain belong to Jimmy Wales and his foundation, our freedoms are protected by something larger. Wikipedia’s content is released under GNU Free Documentation License. The Wikipedia nay sayers might simply not know the details of how GPL works, but Wikipedia, as a vision, is here to stay, wether Jimmy Wales is running it or not. This is inherent in the license in which Wikipedia is released under. Both the MediaWiki (the actual Wiki application) and the contents of the website are released under GPL. This means that at any point if the public becomes dissatisfied with Wikipedia’s leadership, a new group of people can simply move everything over to a new domain name and brand.

    Wikipedia’s license, the GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) requires that any derivative of works from Wikipedia must be released under that same license, must state that it is released under that license, and reproduce a complete copy of the license in all copies of the work, and must acknowledge the main authors (which some claim can be accomplished with a link back to that article on Wikipedia)

    Right now this might seem inconceivable because of the popular Wikipedia brand, but there have been two very recent examples of very successful open source projects forking and becoming more popular than it’s predecessor.

    In 1992, XFree86 became an free implementation X, the Unix Windowing system, and over time grew to become the de-facto X installation on all major Linux and BSD distributions. [1]. But in “February 2004, [XFree86] adopted a license… that the Free Software Foundation considered GPL incompatible.” [2] And as a result developers took the latest license compatible released and moved development onto X.org.

    And more recently, the makers of the open source content management system, Mambo, “formed a non-profit foundation with the stated purpose to fund the project and protect it from lawsuits” and “the development team claimed that… the foundation structure… included provisions that violated core Open Source values.” [4] And as a result, over 3000 followers moved over to the new project, started the by developers, called Joomla. Joomla is now one of the most popular content management systems.

    I do not think that Wikipedia is infallible and I definitely do not think that only “insiders” should be be involved in the project. But we should all know by now that with maturity comes responsibility, and when building a repository that encompasses all human knowledge, leadership, not philosophical slogans is required. Wikipedia will not stray far from its ideals, and in case it does, Wikipedia – the vision – will continue on course to become the library of the 21st century.

     

    • Dylan 1:26 am on June 28, 2006 Permalink

      I agree in the sense that Wikipedia is never going away. And in that respect, long live the GPL.

      But you cannot say that it is the ultimate repository of human knowledge, as that model of thought requires that the knowledge and information be on the page before it is typed!

      What I am saying is that you have one hell of an article here. However, the method of reasoning is somewhat reminiscent of quantum theory.

      A base of infinite knowledge cannot be presented in any medium, as the requirements would be physically impossible because the information would need to be presented before it was thought up. The knowledge would in essense become the precursor to the thought itself, which is currently contemporarily inconceivable.

    • TetraDaC 8:33 pm on June 29, 2006 Permalink

      I’m not sure I understand Dylan’s quantum theory reference. The purpose of a Wikipedia (or any encyclopedia) is less so to represent infinite knowledge (as it certainly can’t achieve this!) and more so to provide people with quick answers if possible and deeper ones if necessary. Human knowledge will hopefully always be growing. An encyclopedia like Wikipedia gives a good indicator of the consensus on what is true about a subject from a top level perspective. If all you want is a basic idea of the topic at hand, then you can just read the article. But for a deeper understanding, follow the “see also” links and read the bibliography. A good Wikipedia article will have a bibliography. Thus, you can think of Wikipedia as the gateway to knowledge but you’ll have to go further to find the deeper stuff.

  • Eddie A. Tejeda 4:20 pm on May 22, 2006 Permalink | Reply  

    Future of the Book’s Gamer Theory Project 

    I worked on a project for the Institute for the Future of the Book called Gamer Theory. It’s looking at the idea of giving books a life of their own and allowing books to become a dynamic forum of discussion of new ideas instead of a static read-only forum. I will write more about this issue at a later time, but the project was fun to work on, so check it out, and participate!

     

  • Eddie A. Tejeda 10:34 am on May 21, 2006 Permalink | Reply  

    Apple takes a step backwards 

    In an era when companies are opening up their technologies to the public, Apple takes a step backwards and closes it’s kernel, out of fear of Mac OS pirates and Mac clones. Although Apple often does not shy away from properitary formats and does not open its technologies to competitors, Apple has been able to get cozy with the academics and open source advocates alike because of it interoperability with GNU/Linux and other Unix clones and because of their perceived contrast to Microsoft in accepting open source and free software.

    Users in demanding fields such as biosciences or meteorology do hack OS kernels to slim them down, alter the balance between throughput and computing, and to open them to the resources of a massive grid. The availability of Intel’s top-shelf compilers, debuggers, libraries, and profilers create unprecedented opportunities to optimize OS X for specific applications.

    Users that require low level access to the internals of the operating system will now have to move away from Apple and possibly towards GNU/Linux for their low level customizations. But this may be a market that Apple is willing to abandon as they penetrate the mainstream. Their record so far has not been very impressive when it comes to opening access to their technology, but I think Apple has been given the benefit of doubt as they’ve tried to regain the market share they lost in the 90’s. Apple also appeared to be moving in the general direction of openness (using the Konqueror engine for Safari and FreeBSD spin off for Kernel), especially when compared to Microsoft. But now that is Apple closing access to it’s kernel (at least those parts the access the processor), I think this is another red flag that Apple is not planning to update its business model towards openness, as many other companies are doing now, and now I think this demonstrates that Apple is still a company that is driven by making profits by restricting access to technology, locking users and limiting competition and therefore limiting innovation.

    I am not saying that Apple needs to become an open source company, but I think the model that restricts users is quickly becoming obsolete, and those who figure out how to make businesses that are not dependent on restricting technology will outlast those seek to lock out users.

     

    • Eddie 9:01 pm on May 21, 2006 Permalink

      I may have spoken too soon about Apple closing its kernel, but this does not necessarily change my view that Apple needs to stop holding its technology so close its chest.

      This is the just the beginning for Apple’s relationship to a growing community that demands interoperability.

    • Dylan 8:37 am on June 17, 2006 Permalink

      Alas, Apple has closed the x86 version of their Darwin XNU kernel.

  • Eddie A. Tejeda 8:57 pm on May 19, 2006 Permalink | Reply  

    Water as Fuel? 

    Here is a video of a cool technology that turns water into a flame that can burn through many metals.

    Some of the prominent characteristic and unique properties thought to be achieved are: no oxidation of the weld; no heat slag; no weld joint inclusions; ability to weld dissimilar materials (i.e. glass to steel, etc.); and a self-adjusting inner-face temperature depending on the substrate being worked ranging to well beyond 10,000° F.

    A company called Hydrogen Technology Applications and is now supposedly working with one American car maker and the US government.

    Modified: I added a bit more emphasis on doubt.

     

  • Eddie A. Tejeda 11:17 am on May 11, 2006 Permalink | Reply  

    Vongo does IPTV 

    I’ve written previously about how people watch movies and television programs on their computer, and about a few cool tools that might lead the way in helping us move away from television. But as clear as the path seems, there was no visible commercial effort to for movies what iTunes has done for music, and i’ve always assumed it had to do with bandwith costs at a massive scales.

    But I recently saw an ad for Starz’s new online movie on-demand service called Vongo. This service works on a subcription basis and for $10 a month you can watch as many movies as you like (given that the connection is fast). This service reminds me of Napster’s attempt to create a subcription based music store. Sadly Napster has not had very good success, even while providing a massive collection. More recently, Napster changed their service a bit and are now providing lower quality streams of their entire music collection in order to attract more people to it. We’ll see how it turns out for Napster, but we’ll see how subcription works for movies. Actually, depending on the success of Napster I wonder if Vongo will ever move to a similar strategy and provide low quality feeds for their movies.

    The current reception of Vongo has been fair, though some people complain that videos are not accessible in iPods. This might seem minor detail at first, but I think it’s a fairly risky move. The people who are attracted to services of this sort like new and cool technology, and also have extra income are the types of people who have iPods. Maybe Vongo is trying to see the big picture and move in directly into homes, but that seems unlikely to happen. The iPod people are a good base to test technology with, and if you get cozy with them, mainstream success is near.

    But sadly this is that this is so far a Windows only client, which is a massive market, but the trends are currently being set Mac users. Mac users are not even allowed to browse the contents of the website! To do so you must download User Agent Switcher for Firefox, and change your user agent to “Netscape 4.8 Windows XP”.

    I would like to see this sort of technology to catch on and wish them success, but they might be making a mistake by not targetting a very influential audience.

     

    • ben vershbow 3:23 pm on May 11, 2006 Permalink

      Warner Bros. just signed a deal with BitTorrent to set up an online movie retail service (NYT). This would be more in the iTunes pay-per-download vein than Vongo, which is more an on demand service. Jumping on bit torrent is a great idea, though from what I gather, the prices will be a little too high for this to catch on big. They also load files with some annoying DRM.

      I download “24″ from illegal bit torrent sites each week. If Fox were to offer a service with fast bit rates, where files automatically started downloading the second the show aired for something like 50 cents per episode, I would use it in a heartbeat. I might even do it for 99 cents an episode. Downloading movies can be a hassle. I think the same logic that made iTunes a success could work here: quality stuff, fast, and at reasonable prices is a better than scouring the net for free shit. And with big video files, bit torrent is clearly the solution. But they’ll probably screw it up.

    • Baratunde 4:08 pm on May 11, 2006 Permalink

      I can’t agree more about the Mac comment, especially for companies doing things with MEDIA. I mean, HELLO??? iTunes, iMovie, iDVD, iPhoto.

      Apple computers ARE media.

      When companies like TiVo and Vongo consistently dis the Mac platform, they’re missing out on valuable feedback from UI and design-conscious consumers. They’re also leaving a bigger opening for Apple itself to come in, DEFINE the user experience and perhaps dominate the market.

      A friend recently sent me a link to check out Vongo, and I couldn’t because I’m on a Mac, so honestly, I don’t care what the pricing, features, catalog are. This product doesn’t exist.

      Same with sites that don’t play well with Firefox.

      Now if only I could find a phone company that WASN’T dumping all my info illegally to the NSA…

    • Eddie 12:04 am on May 12, 2006 Permalink

      Ben,

      I agree completely. The costs of downloads can be cut down dramatically if content was distributed with bittorrent. The problem is that you have to wait for the entire file to download before you watch the movie. Serial downloads allow you to watch the movie while it downloads.

      Baratunde,

      I am glad you agree with my comment about Apple. By the way, use the trick I mentioned to report to websites you use “Netscape 4.8 Windows XP”! The website does not offer much by itself, but I hate the idea of being blocked from a website. So I bypass it even if it’s not for any good reason…

    • Steve 5:28 pm on May 31, 2006 Permalink

      Vongo is a low quality service. And you can do what Vongo does for free…since all they are doing is repurposing their Starz content and selling it over the web. They add a few concerts and charge DVD rental prices for low quality content and then brand it. For anyone seriously thinking of using online video they need high-res content, ease of use, ease of portability and much better rights to view content on different devices. Something to actually make the experience fun and not cumbersome. Vongo is doing nothing really innovative or creative. Why waste your time. It would be much funner to do it yourself with a good video card or HD capture card or DVR connected to your laptop. Even a Sling box. All of which can be used to copy broadcast content and encode it and share it…for PERSONAL use…legally. Skip Vongo altogether and save your money. Wait until a real service comes out that allows you to download, copy, burn, and port the movies.

  • Eddie A. Tejeda 8:05 am on March 2, 2006 Permalink | Reply  

    New Project Launched: iamdotdot 

    I’ve just launched iamdotdot.com. I do not want give away the goal of the project, but please go to the link and submit your answer. After you submit your answer you’ll get more information on what this project is all about. In order for this project to be successful, I need user participation, to please reffer your friends to the site. The site is just one form.

     

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