Category: All Things Geek

Geeks are looking to the future by their very nature

Brian Tong Interviews Neil Degrasse Tyson

Carl Setzer

I’ve enjoyed Brian Tong’s CNET reporting for years, especially his commentary during the various Apple announcements. I see that he’s, now, taking a leap into the new gig economy. I took a bit of a deep dive to catch up on what he’s up-to and think he’s onto something. Check out his Patreon for more info.

Anyway, of all the stuff he’s created over the past few weeks, he interviewed Neil deGrasse Tyson at San Diego Comicon and asked some fun questions. I wouldn’t have pegged Tyson, for instance, as an iPhone guy. Anyway, what a fun interview and one that makes me mildly envious.

Oh Dear God, More Autoplay Video Annoyances

Carl Setzer

 

Ok, gobs of us non-silicon types have vented on the internet about auto-play videos. But instead of listening to us, webdevs are now playing “here, hold my beer” in a case of outdoing each other in obnoxiousness. Just loaded a site that flooded my office with a cacophony of raucousness reminiscent of the Tower of Babble.  About 1 second in, I no longer cared, much less remembered, what I opened the page to read. Closed it and moved on, as is my policy.

So, again my webdevy chums, I know you folks need to capitalize on your work. I get it. But don’t render your site useless in either blinding greed or desperation.

Reflections on the Day 

Carl Setzer

I spent part of the evening watching the Google IO keynote. Seeing the diversity delighted me. Men, women, Whites, Asians, but I was solidly struck by lack of black people. Now, I was multitasking while watching, and I didn’t watch the full two hour one, opting for an abridged one. So, I might have missed the them. But that’s my big takeaway.

I’ve wondered how to increase diversity in tech. Deliberate action would the best. There’s a wide range of subjectivity to the phrase, which I’ll explore later.

One thing I love about tech: accessibility. I love the tools to bring more people to work, to have access to a living wage.

I’m delighted at the ever-increasing number of folks who are working. Thus is a key promise of tech. And though we’ve come a long way, there’s so much more.
Let’s get to work! Well, in the morning, perhaps.

And a new printer acquired…

Carl Setzer

As I lamented earlier this afternoon, my Canon Pixma bit the proverbial big one and has now migrated to the decaying pile of electronics in my garage. Soon the man in the cart will come by crying “bring out your dead” and out it will go.

So, after a bit of research, I opted for an Epson XP-640.

With good reviews (4.5ish on both BestBuy & Amazon), decent print times and decent cartridge replacement prices, seemed the best best for our needs. Mostly what we do at home is print out the occasional homework assignment, Amazon return label…stuff like that. Don’t need anything grandiose.

I must say that the installation process was straightforward and remarkably uncomplicated. And connecting it to my wifi was easy as well.

Feeling good about the choice. My old Canon, and considerably more moolah, connected to our wifi network without too much aggravation. But after “a bit” (a couple of months…not too sure), it wouldn’t connect to the network. Sneakerneting it with my PC direct connected to it via USB worked tolerably well. It was something I “was going to get to”…and, well, you know…life.

Anyway, we’ll see how this plays out with the networked printing. I’ll probably explore printing from my phone on this. But now, as I’ve been fighting a cold and am feeling dreadful, I’m going to take a nap. If I don’t lay down, I’ll be napping at my desk.

Cheers!

Cheers!

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