Monthly Archives: June 2005

Butterfly Gardening

In the last couple of days, we’ve seen an explosion of butterflies (well, I mean a lot of butterflies, not actually exploding butterflies) around the neighborhood. If you like butterflies, perhaps you could use the University of Minnesota Extension Service’s guide on Butterfly Gardening, converting your garden into an attractive locale for the insects that don’t elicit an “ew!” response.

Heart Rate Log For Today’s Exercise

Heart Rate, Jun 04, 2005Well, today I wore my Polar heart rate watch to the gym, and downloaded this nice log of my 45 minute workout. I did 30 minutes on the treadmill, alternating a quarter mile at a four mile per hour pace, and a quarter mile of running at a five mile per hour pace. I then did 15 minutes on the elliptical trainer at a mostly easy pace.

I uploaded the data from my watch to the computer, exported it as a text file, and then wrote a simple little gnuplot script to graph it and dump it as a png file.

Groovy.

Education on the meaning of the word “public domain”

Dan put me onto Turtle’s 78 RPM Jukebox, a site which contains some very nice recordings of old 78 RPM records which are in the public domain. Some very cool stuff, but it contains the following puzzling disclaimer:

All original recordings are understood to be in the public domain.
All selections in this jukebox are the sole property of Turtle Services Limited.
Each contains a unique signature.
Enjoy each for your personal pleasure but do not use any for a commercial purpose!

If something is in the public domain, you can’t put any restrictions on its use. From the Copyright FAQ:

Where is the public domain?

The public domain is not a place. A work of authorship is in the public domain if it is no longer under copyright protection or if it failed to meet the requirements for copyright protection. Works in the public domain may be used freely without the permission of the former copyright owner.

You can’t claim that a work is in the public domain and then turn around and pretend like you have copyright on it without creating a new derivative work out of it. The courts have pretty consistently upheld that mastering old material into new formats does not qualify because typically such transcriptions involve purely technical as opposed to artistic decisions.

Nolo has an excellent book on the subject that can help educate you on issues relating to this.

Addendum: To back up my claim, check out this page, section 496.03(b)(2) Noncopyrightable elements for a list of modifications which do not justify the claim of copyright.

Gnuplot usage

Lisa uses her weblog to remind her of things that are hard to remember like the instructions to her watch. I have done a few things like that (like the command line for burning DVDs on my FreeBSD box) and I thought I’d also put a couple of gnuplot reminders here. (I use gnuplot for all sorts of things, mostly as a quick data visualization tool).

You can insure that the output is a square by typing:

set size square

If you want a certain aspect ratio, use:

set size ratio n

If n is negative, then it ensures that the units of each axis is that ratio. For instance, to plot some orthographic map data, I used:

set size ratio -1
set xrange [-1:1]
set yrange [-1:1]
plot "map.dat" with lines

I’m sure this will be useful sometime in the future.

Unique visitors to brainwagon.org

Here’s a graph of the number of visitors to brainwagon.org over the last 140 days, with a quadratic curve fit.

Five reasons social networking doesn’t work – CNET.com

Molly Wood has an article on CNET detailing Five reasons social networking doesn’t work. I think it’s worth reading. Her top reason:

There’s nothing to do there.

Amen. The real problem is that once you bother going to a social networking networking website, there is nothing to actually do except email and posting, and we already have perfectly good ways of doing that without them.

It’s also interesting to note how her opinions may differ from those of men. There is a definite undercurrent of sexual harrassment that should not be ignored.

Addendum: I just tried to log into orkut for the first time in months. I suddenly remembered why I stopped using it. Within 30 seconds I got an error message indicating that there server had “done something unexpected”. Uh, yeah. Bite me.

Ukulele Beatles Fun!

Previously I mentioned a $22 build it yourself ukulele kit and also found an inspiring rendition of Live and Let Die performed on the ukulele (absolutely brilliant). In that same spirit, here is Ukulele Beatles Fun, a very cool site which lists somewhere around sixty different Beatles songs that you can click on, and it will show you a flash movie of the chords for the song on a graphical rendition of a ukulele as it plays the recording.

It’s just…. amazing.

Brainwagon Radio: Mystery Podcast

Yesterday I recorded a podcast on the way to work, but due to a computer glitch at work, I was unable to upload it immediately. As a result, I simply can’t remember what the heck it was about. I suspect that at least part of it was a rant against automobile repair places, but beyond that, I’m drawing a blank. I guess I’ll have to download it just like you and see what it’s about. 🙂

Addendum: I’m listening to the podcast, and mentioned the OBD II diagnostic connector that all new cars (post 1996) have. Here’s a gadget from thinkgeek that hooks up to such a connector and displays it on an LCD panel. Cool stuff.

Addendum2: Oh yes, Joe’s Crab Shack in San Francisco, absolutely terrible. Worst seafood meal I’ve had, maybe ever. Dante’s Bar on Fisherman’s Wharf: Jake’s Wild Brew killed the pain in my feet.

Addendum3: Oh yes, we went purse shopping too. Yeah, I know, listen anyway for the link to intellectual property issues.

What I want to know is…

just how did this seem like a good idea?

I mean really, did someone pitch the idea like “I know, to emphasize how the comments in the press can turn around and reflect badly on our organization, let’s make a training video featuring a topless lesbian wedding!”? Did that seem like a good idea to someone? Did anyone actually say “yes, that’s what we need to help inform our members to straighten up and fly right!”?

Sweet Zombie Jesus.

My bookshelf

My bookshelf

Just another test of my camera phone and automatic posting.

I think my copy of Darwin’s Origin of Species is on the shelf above though. I actually think Stroustrup’s C++ Programming Language may in fact be the most harmful book of the 19th and 20th centuries.

Ten Most Harmful Books of the 19th and 20th Centuries

With only brief commentary on my part, I submit Human Events, The National Conservative Weekly’s list of the Ten Most Harmful Books of the 19th and 20th Centuries.

The Kinsey Report? Number Four?

Dewey’s Democracy and Education? Admittedly, two topics not generally favored by conservatives…

I also liked their synopsys of Keynes’ General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money:

Keynes was a member of the British elite–educated at Eton and Cambridge–who as a liberal Cambridge economics professor wrote General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money in the midst of the Great Depression. The book is a recipe for ever-expanding government. When the business cycle threatens a contraction of industry, and thus of jobs, he argued, the government should run up deficits, borrowing and spending money to spur economic activity. FDR adopted the idea as U.S. policy, and the U.S. government now has a $2.6-trillion annual budget and an $8-trillion dollar debt.

Oh, is that what caused the deficit and the debt?

Notable Honorable mentions include Darwin’s Origin of the Species [sic] and Descent of Man, Ralph Nader’s Unsafe at Any Speed and Freud’s Introduction to Psychoanalysis. Books which hilighted environmental problems and feminism also seemed to be high on their list.