Bus Stop

Game of LIfe

The universe of the Game of Life is an infinite two-dimensional orthogonal grid of square cells, each of which is in one of two possible states, live or dead. Every cell interacts with its eight neighbours, which are the cells that are directly horizontally, vertically, or diagonally adjacent. At each step in time, the following transitions occur:

1. Any live cell with fewer than two live neighbours dies, as if by loneliness.
2. Any live cell with more than three live neighbours dies, as if by overcrowding.
3. Any live cell with two or three live neighbours lives, unchanged, to the next generation.
4. Any dead cell with exactly three live neighbours comes to life.

The initial pattern constitutes the 'seed' of the system. The first generation is created by applying the above rules simultaneously to every cell in the seed—births and deaths happen simultaneously, and the discrete moment at which this happens is sometimes called a tick. (In other words, each generation is a pure function of the one before.) The rules continue to be applied repeatedly to create further generations.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conway%27s_Game_of_Life

Challenge > Service

Has it been a tough month? Things been a little more difficult than usual? Feeling a sense of burn out or generally tired of the daily grind?

Well, good news is in the air. Today marks the final day of the Natural Time Calendar (mayan) Moon of Challenge.

Tomorrow officialy begins the Moon of Service, or as my wife and I liked to call it during our honeymoon, the Moon of 'room' Service.

So rejoice, relax and enjoy the spoils of your work. You deserve it.

Oh yeah, it's also the middle of Portal Week, and tomorrow is White Rhythmic Dog - Happy Portal day Waldorf!

Work Elsewhere

I needed to copy some stuff off the white board in our conference room and do a little brainstorming on my own this afternoon. Sitting in a different spot than my desk has opened up my mind to new ideas and just a varied way of thinking than if I was sitting on my desk with the usual process, distractions and flow.

If you can (i.e. have a laptop), and feel stuck trying to write that report or spec, try getting up, going to another room, coffee shop or park. You'll be astonished at the effect it has...

Brokedown Palace - Phil Lesh and Jackie Greene Acoustic

Crude Awakening Fireball - Burning Man 2007

I saw this, up close and personal...

Jam Session-Trey Anastasio, Nicholas Payton, Bobby Weir

Trey Anastasio, Nicholas Payton and Bobby Weir jam at the November 2001 Connecticut Forum Event

Darwin Quote

"It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change." - Darwin

From One of Bob Leftsetz's better rants on the music business

It's Every Cuss Word We Know

Steve Jobs is the smartest man alive

First, watch the keynote from this week's Apple announcement of the new iPod line-up.

He's a brilliant marketer. Everything is calculated, setting themselves up for the forthcoming holiday season. Whether you love him or hate him, you've gotta admire the poise.

He rolls out a huge improvement to the iPod lineup and then says "Oh wait, just one more thing..." and rolls out the iPod Touch (aka iPhone clone w/o the phone). They figured out why wi-fi enabled music devices are so hard to do...it's those pesky Hotel Wireless sign-up screens. The iPod touch has Safari built in with a keyboard, problem solved.

Then he goes onto to talk about the success of the iPhone and (gasp) drops the price by $200.

As an early adopter iPhone user, I felt immediately slighted, pissed, taken, lied to and generally upset. Then of course I shrugged and say, 'thats what i get' for running to something so soon. It was only a matter of time before they dropped the price, I just didn't think it would be so soon.

But he's a smart man. He knows that price was the biggest barrier, and now everyone and their mother and for their mother will be buying an iPhone because they've heard from all their friends how great it is to use.

Then, for those who feel the pain of having already thrown down the extra $200 for the privilage of being able to say you had one early, Steve just came out with an open letter explaining his position and offering a $100 gift-certificate for any early iPhone buyer at the Apple Store.

This in no way makes the pain go away. It does nothing to change the fact that I bought something 7 weeks ago which is now $200 cheaper. But what it does do is show that Steve understands his customer.

He obviously knew this was going to happen. He realized that if he lowered the price that people would scream bloody murder. At no point in the last 3 days was he taken off guard by any of the reactions. But he knows that the people who own iPhone are Apple lovers and devotees, and even though they felt slighted, they'd all grin an bear it.

The $100 gift certificate is a token of appreciation and simply more money put towards marketing and advocacy. I'm impressed.

and yes, I'm trying to figure out how to fix the new jambase search and give all our users a time rebate...stay tuned for some improvements :)

James Brown & Pavarotti