just an asterisk

[My friend] and I were chatting about our computers last night and were complaining how a computer has a shelf life of roughly 3-5 years. This is annoying. Obviously there’s nothing we can about technological advances making our computers outdated eventually, thus requiring us to buy a new one.
However what can we do to treat our computers nicer to prevent mechanical breakdowns that necessitate new purchases?
One debate we had was this: is it better for your computer to leave it on, but in sleep mode turning it off only at day’s end? or is it better to turn it off every time you’re not using it? We felt that frequent switches on and off would be worse, but other people–who shall remain nameless–argues that simply shutting the laptop screen while it’s still on is bad for the computer.
Can you clear up this debate and offer other tips to increase a laptop’s lifespan?

I assume that you don’t care about my theories on computer hardware responding to karmic interference… so let’s keep to the facts.  There are plenty of arguments out on the web for keeping a computer on or not, but I think it’s a pretty simple discussion:

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How did this happen???

When was I in a sandstorm with my desktop keyboard?  Did they roach bomb my apartment without me knowing?  This is disgusting…

A new camera, with pretty resolution and increased motivation to play, can create … stress.  In my case, I took a picture of my keyboard, just playing with the close up zoom and almost threw up.  It was filthy!!!  Thus began my quest – I was going to clean it, no matter how long it took (and considering how long it took… it’s probably a good thing I made a blood oath on it…)

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I recently read an interesting article in the MIT Technology review about data privacy and I found myself wondering if all of these data privacy hubbub really came down to just finding a secure way to share our personal data. Duh! – you’re probably saying, but hear me out. This doesn’t have to be so simple. In fact, in my geeky opinion, there is a very large opportunity for an organization to capitalize on the use of biometrics to provide a true and unbreakable method of identification. You may balk at this – most people dislike being presented with this answer. And yet at the same time, we hand out Social Security numbers as if they were candy, allowing even the guy at the cell phone store the key to the intimate details of our personal lives. Privacy advocates may ask “who watches the watchmen?” but to these naysayers, I argue that this situation is getting out of hand. It’s time for someone to fix the risk to our privacy – our futures depend on it. Read more »

On October 28th 2009, I will be 10,000 days old. Anyone want to celebrate?

Check out the proof here and try your own calculation…

~ab

Ok so i think we’ve established that I am a geek and proud of it.  I love data, tools that make visualization easy and just generally, the power of knowledge.  I love that a slow but steady direction for the web is the improvement of search, both with improvements to traditional sites like Google and with interesting newcomers to the seen like WolframAlpha and Cuil. 

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I can’t seem to get away from it – whenever I hear someone has a new camera, I’m programmed to respond with “How many megapixels?” Why would I want to break this habit? Because it doesn’t matter!!!! Seriously people, we need to work together here. Megapixels are like weight for cell phones. Most phones only weigh a few ounces these days, but people still seem interested in getting a “light” phone. A recent blackberry ad on the subway even screamed “LIGHT!” as one of the three most important things you had to know about the new Curve. Should that be a reason to buy that phone? Probably not – all phones are light. Should megapixels be a reason to buy a camera? Again, probably not. Read more »