Le demo di una volta, per il Commodore 64, spiegate bene. (Peraltro un notevole hack)
Money quote: "So I recently made this little sinewave demo effect on the Commodore 64
This generated a lot of lively discussion on twitter and /r/c64. A bunch of people were curious as to how it works and I promised to explain it on my blog.
The main idea is to use character mode with a custom character set. I sample y-coordinate every 8 pixels to produce a list of line segments (0, y0), (8, y1), (16, y2), ..., (320, y40). In the below animation, you can see these line segments along with blue rectangles that signify which 8x8 character blocks intersect the line segments."
http://nurpax.github.io/posts/2018-06-07-c64-filled-sinewave.html
Money quote: "So I recently made this little sinewave demo effect on the Commodore 64
This generated a lot of lively discussion on twitter and /r/c64. A bunch of people were curious as to how it works and I promised to explain it on my blog.
The main idea is to use character mode with a custom character set. I sample y-coordinate every 8 pixels to produce a list of line segments (0, y0), (8, y1), (16, y2), ..., (320, y40). In the below animation, you can see these line segments along with blue rectangles that signify which 8x8 character blocks intersect the line segments."
http://nurpax.github.io/posts/2018-06-07-c64-filled-sinewave.html
nurpax.github.io
nurpax - Break down of a C64 demo effect
MacOS 10.14 Mojave: cosa cambia e come aggiornare il vostro Mac. Vi racconto come si fa l'aggiornamento in questo articolo per Wired.it (e come va il nuovo sistema operativo di Apple: tldr alla grande!)
https://www.wired.it/gadget/computer/2018/09/24/macos-10-14-mojave/
https://www.wired.it/gadget/computer/2018/09/24/macos-10-14-mojave/
WIRED.IT
MacOS 10.14 Mojave: cosa cambia e come aggiornare il vostro Mac
Dopo l'aggiornamento di iOS 12 per iPhone e iPad, più quelli per Apple Watch e Apple TV, arriva anche quello per il Mac. Le principali novità e quando conviene installarlo (oppure no)
Non potremmo più vivere senza l'inglese. Ma il cinese è diventato un'altra cosa. Però com'è la mente di chi legge e scrive con i caratteri cinesi? Beh, perché non chiederlo a una AI che fa finta osservandola per trarne delle connessioni culturali? Il nuovo impero dei segni?
Money quote: "We would have to spend a lot of time during the weeknights memorising passages to prepare for the test on the following Saturday. A score less than perfection is frowned upon. This would go on for years. I still have nightmares about those dictation tests. I think that’s how most children learn Chinese as well via this rote learning method around the world. Maybe in some sense, Chinese language education resembles how LSTM’s are trained to reproduce sequences from training examples."
http://blog.otoro.net/2015/12/28/recurrent-net-dreams-up-fake-chinese-characters-in-vector-format-with-tensorflow/
Money quote: "We would have to spend a lot of time during the weeknights memorising passages to prepare for the test on the following Saturday. A score less than perfection is frowned upon. This would go on for years. I still have nightmares about those dictation tests. I think that’s how most children learn Chinese as well via this rote learning method around the world. Maybe in some sense, Chinese language education resembles how LSTM’s are trained to reproduce sequences from training examples."
http://blog.otoro.net/2015/12/28/recurrent-net-dreams-up-fake-chinese-characters-in-vector-format-with-tensorflow/
Il capo di iFixit ha fatto rumore con questo lungo pezzo in cui spiega perché i MacBook Pro di Apple non vanno bene per niente
Money quote: "The first-gen butterfly keyboard showed up in 2015, but the real root of the problem dates back to 2012 in the very first Retina MacBook Pro. That radical redesign replaced their rugged, modular workhorse with a slimmed-down frame and first-of-its-kind retina display.
And a battery glued to the keyboard."
https://ifixit.org/blog/10229/macbook-pro-keyboard/
Money quote: "The first-gen butterfly keyboard showed up in 2015, but the real root of the problem dates back to 2012 in the very first Retina MacBook Pro. That radical redesign replaced their rugged, modular workhorse with a slimmed-down frame and first-of-its-kind retina display.
And a battery glued to the keyboard."
https://ifixit.org/blog/10229/macbook-pro-keyboard/
iFixit
Apple Engineers Its Own Downfall With the Macbook Pro Keyboard
A titan of tech and industrial innovation has been laid low by a mere speck of dust. Last week, Apple quietly announced that they were extending the warranty on their flagship laptop’s keyboard by…
Furono i postini americani a sconfiggere la Mano Nera degli immigrati italiani.
Money quote: “No law enforcement institution in the nation had been able to penetrate the criminal organizations that had begun quietly terrorizing cities across America, particularly those with large populations of immigrants from Italy. Nearly 6 million Italian immigrants entered the country in the last two decades of the 1800s and organized crime, common in their native country, often found its way across the Atlantic, too. Increasingly in the papers, the gruesome crimes were credited to “Black Hand” criminals because of several recovered threat letters penned by “La Mano Nero” that demanded exorbitant payments, or death.”
https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2018/09/16/the-postal-inspector-who-took-down-americas-first-organized-crime-ring-219597
Money quote: “No law enforcement institution in the nation had been able to penetrate the criminal organizations that had begun quietly terrorizing cities across America, particularly those with large populations of immigrants from Italy. Nearly 6 million Italian immigrants entered the country in the last two decades of the 1800s and organized crime, common in their native country, often found its way across the Atlantic, too. Increasingly in the papers, the gruesome crimes were credited to “Black Hand” criminals because of several recovered threat letters penned by “La Mano Nero” that demanded exorbitant payments, or death.”
https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2018/09/16/the-postal-inspector-who-took-down-americas-first-organized-crime-ring-219597
POLITICO
The Postal Inspector Who Took Down America’s First Organized Crime Ring
Frank Oldfield and the Post Office scheme that toppled the Society of the Banana.
La poesia è tutt’altro che morta. E questo canale, con il suo poeta residente (Roberto “Bob” R. Corsi), lo sa bene.
Money quote: “In its most recent survey, conducted in 2017 and published in 2018, the NEA found that, contrary to the sharp decline it had observed in previous surveys, poetry—reports of its death, etc.—had in fact seen a massive rise in popularity. The number of self-reported poetry readers in the United States nearly doubled between 2012 and 2017, that survey found”
https://www.theatlantic.com/amp/article/567571/
Money quote: “In its most recent survey, conducted in 2017 and published in 2018, the NEA found that, contrary to the sharp decline it had observed in previous surveys, poetry—reports of its death, etc.—had in fact seen a massive rise in popularity. The number of self-reported poetry readers in the United States nearly doubled between 2012 and 2017, that survey found”
https://www.theatlantic.com/amp/article/567571/
The Atlantic
Poetry Is Everywhere
Far from “going extinct,” as it was once predicted, poems are viral, vital—and invincible.
Arriva la Ricoh GR III. Ho comprato anni fa la II, che è la mia piccola, meravigliosa macchina digitale.
Money quote: "Nel corso di oltre 20 anni di storia, la serie in questione ha mantenuto il concetto base di ottimizzazione dei valori essenziali di una fotocamera: qualità d’immagine, portabilità e praticità operativa; il produttore parla di “cambiamenti e perfezionamenti necessari per soddisfare le necessità emergenti” spiegando che i modelli della serie GR sono scelti da numerosi fotografi, professionisti ed amatoriali con esperienza."
https://www.macitynet.it/ricoh-gr-iii-fotocamera-digitale-compatta-di-fascia-alta-in-anteprima-a-photokina-2018/
Money quote: "Nel corso di oltre 20 anni di storia, la serie in questione ha mantenuto il concetto base di ottimizzazione dei valori essenziali di una fotocamera: qualità d’immagine, portabilità e praticità operativa; il produttore parla di “cambiamenti e perfezionamenti necessari per soddisfare le necessità emergenti” spiegando che i modelli della serie GR sono scelti da numerosi fotografi, professionisti ed amatoriali con esperienza."
https://www.macitynet.it/ricoh-gr-iii-fotocamera-digitale-compatta-di-fascia-alta-in-anteprima-a-photokina-2018/
Macitynet.it
RICOH GR III, fotocamera digitale compatta di fascia alta, in anteprima a Photokina 2018 - Macitynet.it
Un'anteprima della fotocamera RICOH GR III sarà visibile a Photokina 2018. Obiettivo di nuova generazione, USB-C, Wi-Fi.
Da buon fiorentino sono cresciuto a cervella di vitello fritte o al tegamino. Poi è arrivata la mucca pazza e ha rovinato tutto per 15 anni almeno. Però mi garbavano, ah se mi garbavano.
Questa delle cervella di maiale per di più a colazione devo dire mi fa un po’ senso. Temo l'infarto per eccesso di colesterolo oltretutto. Ma chissà, magari ne vale la pena.
Money quote: “The brains, typically pork, are seasoned with salt, pepper, and a bit of paprika, then tossed in a hot pan before the eggs are added into the mix. The protein medley is then served on its own or packed into a biscuit for those on-the-go mornings. Diners describe the texture as soft with a relenting firmness, akin to curdled yogurt or firm tofu with a fatty aftertaste. If you can get past the massive cholesterol punch this breakfast food delivers, you’ll be sure to enjoy its savory flavor.”
https://www.atlasobscura.com/foods/scrambled-brains-and-eggs
Questa delle cervella di maiale per di più a colazione devo dire mi fa un po’ senso. Temo l'infarto per eccesso di colesterolo oltretutto. Ma chissà, magari ne vale la pena.
Money quote: “The brains, typically pork, are seasoned with salt, pepper, and a bit of paprika, then tossed in a hot pan before the eggs are added into the mix. The protein medley is then served on its own or packed into a biscuit for those on-the-go mornings. Diners describe the texture as soft with a relenting firmness, akin to curdled yogurt or firm tofu with a fatty aftertaste. If you can get past the massive cholesterol punch this breakfast food delivers, you’ll be sure to enjoy its savory flavor.”
https://www.atlasobscura.com/foods/scrambled-brains-and-eggs
Atlas Obscura
The Fading Southern Tradition of Scrambled Eggs and Pork Brains
Fresh and canned brains are used to make the savory breakfast.
Signore e signori, fake news e tapas per tutti!
Money quote: "Merlo’s Victory Lab is one of the estimated hundreds of homegrown Mexican Cambridge Analytica–like marketing firms that are constantly filling up the country’s social media platforms with junk. Victory Lab will make anything trend on any platform for a fee. He said a hashtag like the one he made for BuzzFeed News would cost around $10,000 if the client really wanted it to trend at number one."
https://www.buzzfeed.com/ryanhatesthis/meet-the-29-year-old-trying-to-become-the-king-of-mexican
Money quote: "Merlo’s Victory Lab is one of the estimated hundreds of homegrown Mexican Cambridge Analytica–like marketing firms that are constantly filling up the country’s social media platforms with junk. Victory Lab will make anything trend on any platform for a fee. He said a hashtag like the one he made for BuzzFeed News would cost around $10,000 if the client really wanted it to trend at number one."
https://www.buzzfeed.com/ryanhatesthis/meet-the-29-year-old-trying-to-become-the-king-of-mexican
BuzzFeed
Meet The 29-Year-Old Trying To Become The King Of Mexican Fake News
Armed with millions of bots and thousands of fake Facebook pages, Carlos Merlo's digital marketing firm is trying to hijack Mexico’s politics with fake news.
Perché l’acquisto di Shazam fa bene agli affari di Apple (e non solo) - il mio articolo per Wired.it
https://www.wired.it/economia/business/2018/09/25/apple-musica-shazam/
https://www.wired.it/economia/business/2018/09/25/apple-musica-shazam/
Wired
Perché l’acquisto di Shazam fa bene agli affari di Apple (e non solo)
Finalizzata l'acquisizione da 400 milioni di dollari, adesso bisogna capire come cambierà la musica di Apple con il servizio di riconoscimento delle canzoni
Al di là della storia personale di questa donna - drammatica, o meglio: traumatica - il concetto di "Woundology" è geniale
Money quote: "Have you ever met someone for the first time and they started telling you all of their problems, their aches and pains, the problems they have with the people in their personal life, work, or that life is just overall crappy for them? They lay it all out there, scapegoating whoever or whatever to blame for their ongoing suffering, to the point where you’re overwhelmed and walk away stunned, yet relieved you escaped. That person is living in their wounds, wearing them like a badge of honor. That’s Woundology."
https://medium.com/redoubtable/woundology-stop-using-your-past-to-define-your-life-70e68972b65a
Money quote: "Have you ever met someone for the first time and they started telling you all of their problems, their aches and pains, the problems they have with the people in their personal life, work, or that life is just overall crappy for them? They lay it all out there, scapegoating whoever or whatever to blame for their ongoing suffering, to the point where you’re overwhelmed and walk away stunned, yet relieved you escaped. That person is living in their wounds, wearing them like a badge of honor. That’s Woundology."
https://medium.com/redoubtable/woundology-stop-using-your-past-to-define-your-life-70e68972b65a
Medium
Woundology: Stop Using Your Past To Define Your Life
Let me say this first: I was abused for many years in my marriages. And before that, in my childhood. For much of my life, I was a victim…
Avete un po' di ossessione per Tetris? Non siete soli. Ma questa semplice partenza apre secondo me una porta inedita a molte altre considerazioni
Money quote: "What do Steve Wozniak and George H.W. Bush have in common? They’ve both been seriously into Tetris! But who can blame them? The object of the game (as if you didn’t know) is to complete horizontal lines using falling shapes of various configurations. When you finish a line, it disappears, causing the rest of the blocks to fall down a line. However, if you stack up shapes to the point they overflow the top of the playfield: Game Over. When you finish a certain number of lines, the level ends… and in the next, the shapes fall faster, and you need to complete more lines! The insanity never ends."
https://paleotronic.com/2018/06/26/tetris-for-applesoft-basic/
Money quote: "What do Steve Wozniak and George H.W. Bush have in common? They’ve both been seriously into Tetris! But who can blame them? The object of the game (as if you didn’t know) is to complete horizontal lines using falling shapes of various configurations. When you finish a line, it disappears, causing the rest of the blocks to fall down a line. However, if you stack up shapes to the point they overflow the top of the playfield: Game Over. When you finish a certain number of lines, the level ends… and in the next, the shapes fall faster, and you need to complete more lines! The insanity never ends."
https://paleotronic.com/2018/06/26/tetris-for-applesoft-basic/
Paleotronic Magazine
Tetris for Applesoft BASIC - Paleotronic Magazine
What do Steve Wozniak and George H.W. Bush have in common? They’ve both been seriously into Tetris! But who can blame them? The object of the game (as if you didn’t know) is to complete [more...]
A Tokyo sono affascinato dalla linea di treni leggeri Yamanote, che fa il giro della parte interna della città. È anche una suddivisione simbolica, un confine fra le due macro-aree della capitale giapponese: i quartieri residenziali (la "mano della montagna") e la città bassa. Tanto che l'altro poarte, la città bassa o Shitamachi, ospita anche un museo della vita quotidiana delle classi lavoratrici piccolo-borghesi. Un museo attaccato al laghetto di Ueno, dove c'è il piccolo albergo tradizionale a gestione famigliare in cui sono solito andare quando visito privatamente Tokyo. La prossima volta, chissà...
Money quote: "The historic separation of Tokyo into two distinct regions has persisted even to this day, though the definitions of the city’s boundaries have expanded. Yamanote (meaning “mountain’s hand”) was the hilly area populated by the rich and the powerful, including Tokugawa vassals and the military elite. Conversely, Shitamachi (meaning “under city” or “low city”) was flat and marshy, and distinctly lower class.
The first floor of the Shitamachi Museum contains a reproduced living space, showing how the latter’s everyday people once lived. "
https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/shitamachi-museum
Money quote: "The historic separation of Tokyo into two distinct regions has persisted even to this day, though the definitions of the city’s boundaries have expanded. Yamanote (meaning “mountain’s hand”) was the hilly area populated by the rich and the powerful, including Tokugawa vassals and the military elite. Conversely, Shitamachi (meaning “under city” or “low city”) was flat and marshy, and distinctly lower class.
The first floor of the Shitamachi Museum contains a reproduced living space, showing how the latter’s everyday people once lived. "
https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/shitamachi-museum
Atlas Obscura
Shitamachi Museum
A museum dedicated to the history of Tokyo's often-overlooked working-class district.
Si dimette l’inventore di Linux: il suo pessimo carattere rischia di rovinare l’azienda - il mio articolo (a pagamento) per La Stampa
http://www.lastampa.it/2018/09/27/tecnologia/il-pap-di-linux-fa-un-passo-indietro-dopo-anni-di-mail-piene-di-insulti-ho-bisogno-di-aiuto-6kgt7yfVXxcTNCfTZqIIcN/premium.html
http://www.lastampa.it/2018/09/27/tecnologia/il-pap-di-linux-fa-un-passo-indietro-dopo-anni-di-mail-piene-di-insulti-ho-bisogno-di-aiuto-6kgt7yfVXxcTNCfTZqIIcN/premium.html
La fotografia computazionale non ci farà sbagliare più una foto - il mio articolo per Wired.it
https://www.wired.it/gadget/foto-e-video/2018/09/27/attimo-deciso-computazionale/
https://www.wired.it/gadget/foto-e-video/2018/09/27/attimo-deciso-computazionale/
Wired
La fotografia computazionale non ci farà sbagliare più una foto
Con i nuovi iPhone Xs e Xs Max Apple introduce nuovi sensori, processori e algoritmi che alimentano il suo neural engine per ottenere foto perfette
Come risolvere il problema dei font sfocati su macOs Mojave - il mio articolo per Wired.it
https://www.wired.it/gadget/computer/2018/09/27/font-sfocati-mojave/
https://www.wired.it/gadget/computer/2018/09/27/font-sfocati-mojave/
WIRED.IT
Come risolvere il problema dei font sfocati su macOs Mojave
L'ultima versione del sistema operativo dei Mac ha un meccanismo di anti-aliasing delle lettere che funziona bene sugli schermi Retina ma è brutto su quelli tradizionali
Jamie Zawinski è uno dei fondatori di Netscape (Mozilla e poi Firefox, per intendersi) nonché creatore degli XScreenSaver, che sono un classico (totalmente gratuito) per macOS e soprattutto per Linux e Unix/Bsd. Ecco, qui il nostro uomo spiega perché non esiste - e non deve esistere - una versione per Windows.
Money quote: "Sometimes people ask me why there is no Windows port of XScreenSaver. The reason is that Microsoft killed my company, and I hold a personal grudge. They are a company with vicious, predatory, anti-competitive business practices, and always have been. They also happen to make terrible products, and always have. I do not use any Microsoft products, and neither should you."
https://www.jwz.org/xscreensaver/xscreensaver-windows.html
Qui una spiegazione su Wikipedia sintetica di cosa siano e come funzionino gli screensaver in questione
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XScreenSaver
e qui "Dna Lounge", il night club molto cyberpunk (modo elegante per dire che ha uno spirito tardo anni Ottanta) che Zawinski gestisce a San Francisco. Ci sono stato, è un posto epico.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DNA_Lounge
Qui, infine, il nostro uomo:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jamie_Zawinski
Money quote: "Sometimes people ask me why there is no Windows port of XScreenSaver. The reason is that Microsoft killed my company, and I hold a personal grudge. They are a company with vicious, predatory, anti-competitive business practices, and always have been. They also happen to make terrible products, and always have. I do not use any Microsoft products, and neither should you."
https://www.jwz.org/xscreensaver/xscreensaver-windows.html
Qui una spiegazione su Wikipedia sintetica di cosa siano e come funzionino gli screensaver in questione
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XScreenSaver
e qui "Dna Lounge", il night club molto cyberpunk (modo elegante per dire che ha uno spirito tardo anni Ottanta) che Zawinski gestisce a San Francisco. Ci sono stato, è un posto epico.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DNA_Lounge
Qui, infine, il nostro uomo:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jamie_Zawinski
Su Medium una catena di cinguettii di twitter di Stephen Sinofsky (che ormai si esprime solo così: ah!, la nevrosi che lo arde da dentro) annotati e amplificati per portare avanti il ragionamento su Amazon e la sua evoluzione. Interessante.
Money quote: "A funny thing happens…"
https://medium.learningbyshipping.com/amazon-4648bdf511c
Money quote: "A funny thing happens…"
https://medium.learningbyshipping.com/amazon-4648bdf511c
Medium
Amazon: Retailers Gonna Retail
The narrative of Amazon’s total disruption of traditional retail and ultimate dominance is well-known. This essay offers an alternative…
È un sacco di tempo che non scrivo per Il Post. Per questo ci tengo particolarmente. E poi perché la storia del primo Boeing 777 per me è speciale
Money quote: "Pian piano, uno dei giganti dell’aria, il primo della sua razza, è andato a dormire. Per sempre."
https://www.ilpost.it/antoniodini/2018/09/28/buonanotte-vecchio-triple-seven/
Money quote: "Pian piano, uno dei giganti dell’aria, il primo della sua razza, è andato a dormire. Per sempre."
https://www.ilpost.it/antoniodini/2018/09/28/buonanotte-vecchio-triple-seven/
Il Post
Buonanotte, vecchio Triple Seven - Antonio Dini
È andato in pensione per sempre il primo Boeing 777, che ha volato 18 anni per Cathay Pacific
Dopo Vivian Maier, che secondo me era già di per sé una (geniale) forma di speculazione, arriva questo Barry Gfeller che è morto e sepolto lasciando però una tonnellata e mezzo di foto scattate di qua e di là. Ti fa capire però che quelle della Maier erano migliori.
Money quote: "“Ultimately, Gfeller drove over 100,000 miles across 44 states and six Canadian provinces between 1977 and 1996," says Mike O’Neill, a political strategist who first learned about Gfeller in 2016. After Gfeller died, the collection made its way from his estate to a Canadian charity. Sixteen years later, the charity asked O’Neill to help find a buyer who could donate the work to a museum. They didn’t have to look far. Fascinated, O’Neill purchased the collection himself in 2017. He's now begun to digitize the prints, and is searching for a long-term home for Gfeller’s archive."
https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/barry-gfeller-photograph-collection
Money quote: "“Ultimately, Gfeller drove over 100,000 miles across 44 states and six Canadian provinces between 1977 and 1996," says Mike O’Neill, a political strategist who first learned about Gfeller in 2016. After Gfeller died, the collection made its way from his estate to a Canadian charity. Sixteen years later, the charity asked O’Neill to help find a buyer who could donate the work to a museum. They didn’t have to look far. Fascinated, O’Neill purchased the collection himself in 2017. He's now begun to digitize the prints, and is searching for a long-term home for Gfeller’s archive."
https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/barry-gfeller-photograph-collection
Atlas Obscura
The Mystery Man Who Spent 20 Years Photographing North American Buildings
His name was Barry Gfeller, and he left behind an astonishing 50,000 previously unseen images.
Perché Apple e Google vogliono che usiamo meno i nostri smartphone? Perché così ci sentiamo più sicuri. Ma pensa te!
Money quote: "With few exceptions, when a product harms people, consumers tend to use it less often or find better alternatives. The feature fight between these two tech rivals benefits everyone. The move to help users create healthy habits with their devices is an example of competition making products better."
https://medium.com/behavior-design/the-real-reason-apple-and-google-want-you-to-use-your-phone-less-37b2b7f1384
Money quote: "With few exceptions, when a product harms people, consumers tend to use it less often or find better alternatives. The feature fight between these two tech rivals benefits everyone. The move to help users create healthy habits with their devices is an example of competition making products better."
https://medium.com/behavior-design/the-real-reason-apple-and-google-want-you-to-use-your-phone-less-37b2b7f1384
Medium
The Real Reason Apple and Google Want You to Use Your Phone Less
This week Apple follows Google by announcing features to help people cut back on their tech use. Why would the companies that make your…