For anyone who has browsed my Links there are a few that seem irrelevant to the focus of this blog (design/rapid prototyping/vr). One of those is Mark Cuban’s “blogmaverick”. For those who aren’t aware, Cuban is one of those crazy success stories; a guy from humble beginnings with the smarts (and balls) to have made a ton of money. Most of the time it seems he blogs about basketball, and as the owner of an NBA franchise that’s understandable. But sometimes he posts some very relevant insights. This one, is such a entry (you just have to get past all the not-so-subtle marketing inside it). Good reading.
Category Archives: reTransmit
The Virtual Office
I’ve been spending a bit of time in Second Life. Having bought my virtual land, I’ve learned the modeling tools and built a virtual office (cleaner than my RL office, sad to say).
And if you want to read a real blog entry (and I’m getting tired of typing tbh; in-world “chatting” is killing my fingertips – getting hoarse, so to speak), feel free to drop in on the Core77 Software & Technology blog where I post related (and often overlapping) entries. If you read my previous entry here called “The Anti-Sony“, today’s entry on Core is essentially a continuation. The dance is the same, just different partners (didn’t some character in STNG say that?)
Going Virtual
Sooner or later this was going to happen: I’m now the proud owner of virtual beachfront property (probably as close as I’ll ever get to owning real waterfront turf). I’ve sent emails out which include a snapshot similar to the above, and now need to begin terraforming I suppose… well, after I figure out what I intend to build.
This certainly doesn’t look anything like the images of cyberspace I imagined while reading Gibson’s short stories (collected in the excellent “Burning Chrome“) or how Robert Longo depicted one of those shorts in the movie “Johnny Mnemonic“. I’ll admit I wonder why that is. There’s an easy answer: we just aren’t prepared for 3D spatial orientations that challenge years of experience about what we understand as “reality”. And then there might be another, simpler explanation altogether: we like sand and sun. Even if it’s virtual.
And Even More FabLab Stuff….
The Economist has posted an article from their print edition reminding everyone that Dr. Gershenfeld has been using RP technology to assist those in need for years. I’ll admit having temporarily forgotten. It’s truly a shame that $20k is too much for some developing countries to afford; probably preventing the more widespread use of his collection of devices. I guess that depressing part of the story helped me forget. Isn’t that roughly the cost of a single Smart bomb?
When Did I Become A Hippy?
Since leaving the cube farm of corporate America and going solo, I’ve found myself ever more increasingly concerned with social issues. Not that I wasn’t previously concerned, I just find myself soaking up more information via the net, mixing the worthwhile bits in with my past experiences, and attempting to integrate the results into my life. Maybe this is a mid-life crises thing. I’m unsure.
This is all to say that I’ve been trading emails with Dr. Bowyer regarding the RepRap project – but (and you guessed it) not in regards to technical issues. As stated previously my real concern was the potential to treat this open source effort as something appropriate only for academia or for those with research experience; to set technical goals but effectively ignore (or at the very least downplay) usability issues. Let’s make something that works, make it freely available to everyone via the internet, but not really concern ourselves with mundane issues like whether people injure themselves attempting to use/misuse the “product”.
I won’t go into details of our discussion but I’m at least impressed that Dr. Bowyer is engaging me in this conversation – there are many I’m sure who would not. This is definitely more encouraging than some product development efforts in which I’ve participated (none of which, I should add, approach either Graco’s shameful behavior or some of the recent automotive recalls).
Maybe I just need a haircut.