jorge.cortell.net

On Tuesday I went to New York University for a nice conversation in the Inside the Internet Garage series, with journalists Walt Mossberg and Kara Swisher (AllThingsDigital, Wall Street Journal, etc).

Besides the very interesting bio/background overview of them that the interviewer did, here are some quotes that caught my attention.

Walt Mossberg:

IT departments are the most regressive force in tech, blocking new tech adoption

The story goes that Larry Page asked Steve Jobs for advice, he said “Find the 5 things you do best, and focus on it”, which it’s what he’s doing

(Talking about Mark Zuckerberg) “you need some megalomania in order to execute your idea better than others”

Kara Swisher:

Sergei Brin has always been the goofy one, but Larry Page = Bill Gates. Walt Mossberg adds: … or like Thomas Jefferson

Q: Has Google lost its edge? Both answer: No.

After the event, I talked a bit with Mr. Mossberg (quite a character, very determined and smart). The funny/sad anecdote came when I told him: “I’ve been reading you for decades” and he replied: “You don’t look that old”. 2 decades and 1 year to be exact. I guess I’m old. My impression of Mrs. Swisher is someone very smart, direct, tough… but humane at the same time.

The beauty of the day? This glitter covered bike I saw walking by SoHo.

After posting graphs and cold data (quite ilustrative, I believe), and the discussion it has generated (people, why don’t you use the “comment” instead all the other unstructured methods you are using?), please let me write a caveat about graphs and cold data.

In my high-tech gym, you have the option to have a lot of data collected, for your own, private and personal use. It seems like a great idea at first. For example, I can access via a secure web site real time stats of my workouts, such as the “fitness balance” (which shows my emphasis in weight lifting, and then swimming -some data greyed out for privacy purposes-):

Sounds great, doesn’t it? Not that fast.

The following graph (Workout Log) allows me to see how many times I have worked out. Since I tend to go to the gym everyday (but it is not always possible), an average of 4 times per week sounds reasonable, but what is that max. 8 times per week number? Why is there such a dip in mid February?

Data often needs to be contextualized, otherwise we might end up with the wrong conclussion (those 8 workouts per week happened to be visits to the gym to do a personal assesment and training routine design, added to my regular workouts; and the dip… just a long trip!).

But even worse things can happen:

In this case, an obviously strange abherration is showing in the graph. Somehting to be concerned about? Not at all: the scale of the axis make a slight variation (less than 1%, less than a pound) seem like a huge shift. And variables such as measurement thresholds, electronic glitches, etc must be taken into account when considering the validity and presentation of that data.

Let’s just keep in mind: however great quantification and visualization tools are (and I do like them a lot, and believe they can be very beneficial to the way we make decissions and understand the world and ourselves) they must be used with care. After all, this following map might show all the places I have traveled to… but it can not tell you about the experiences lived there…

Map + Newspapers + Translations = Simple and AWESOME!!

Newspapermap.com

Lego web design, anyone?

While I am preparing a loooooong post about technology and privacy (with a provocative twist, for a change ), I have decided to play with face.com‘s face recognition technology.

What do you think? On target (hint: no, not on target, I am not THAT old, and definitely I AM a male)? Scary (hint: only if we are unaware of these technologies and their uses)?…

Reading RSS on my smartphone, click on a YouTube video, send it to the computer via Phone2Chrome…

I read on a newspaper tablet version that TED is now on Netflix, turn on the Google TV Logitech Revue with Able Remote on my phone and start Netflix, adding TED to my Instant Que…

Remember all that “convergence” talk?

Do you want to improve your online privacy? Go ahead, install HTTPS and Collusion.

Last Saturday I went to the ArtHack Exhibit closing party at 319 Scholes St, Brooklyn (New York).

Located in an industrial complex in Brooklyn, at night, loooong two blocks from the subway, graffiti all over, small door… that gave way to heaven: young (I was the oldest hacker in that space, but I did not feel that way) energetic happy people tinkering with technology and proudly showing their “toys” (hacks, mashups, creations, or whatever). From the 15sec-at-a-time Star Wars fan-boy movie, to the shoot-the-DJ video game, including the bicycle computer interface, the “swim” in front of a kinect to navigate with a browser, the mesh-connected game-of-life sync router status lights, the iPhone jump-rope, the Tororo figure being sculpted by the MakerBots (Replicator and Thing-O-Matic), the GIF Booth Hack as demonstrated by Ashley and Katie… it was all great fun.

As a bonus, on the way back, I got a twilio tshirt, several stickers (Etsy, MakerBot, Alphaonelabs…) and great photo opportunities of the surroundings. That is what I call a great Saturday evening.

I just installed RePress: This plug-in enables you to magically uncensor any website on the internet from your own WordPress installation. Why and How.

Mientras seguimos a vueltas con la “Inteligencia Artificial”, el ser humano se empeña en conseguir la “naturaleza artificial”. Un par de ejemplos recientes:

- Bebés tiburón nacidos de útero artificial

- Hojas artificiales capaces de realizar fotosíntesis