internet « white male consumer

Connecting Ps3 To Powerbook Interweb

Posted January 18th, 2009 at 1:48PM

I’ve been trying to share media between my Powerbook and Playstation 3 so that I can keep all of my audio and video files on my external hard drive, and watch them on the TV. Haven’t figured it out yet (looks like 3rd party software is necessary). But in the process, I’ve gotten it so my PS3 is now online, wirelessly connected to dial-up! Woo!

So far I’ve been able to log into the Playstation Network and use the PS3 internet browser, but no multiplayer inside a game (keeps timing out, understandably). Also doesn’t help that all of my games are out of date and ask to download updates before connecting. It’d be a riot if I could attempt multiplayer over dial-up though.

Anyway, it took a lot of trial + error to get my laptop to share internet via AirPort (using “DHCP” – whatever that means), so here’s my former stumbling block:

Make Internet Sharing DHCP work with an Xbox/Xbox 360 (or PS3!)
(for OSX 10.4+)

Start Internet Sharing if it’s not already running.

Open NetInfo Manager, located in /Applications » Utilities. Authenticate as an administrator using the lock icon in the lower-left.

Navigate to the /config/dhcp node (so that dhcp is selected in the browser pane).

In the lower pane, find the reply_threshold_seconds property and change its value from 4 to 0.

Quit NetInfo Manager and then restart your Mac.

After the restart, open NetInfo Manager again and confirm that reply_threshold_seconds is still 0.

Hope it helps someone!

“White Spaces”?

Posted August 18th, 2008 at 4:58PM

There is a better way forward: free up the unused airwaves, so that more entrepreneurs can get into the market, build the wireless technologies of tomorrow, and roll out faster, low-cost Internet access. Right now, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is considering whether to open up a vast, vacant swath of spectrum — the TV “white spaces.” Rather than being sold to private companies via exclusive licenses, this spectrum would be unlicensed, owned by no one and available to everyone.

At Google, we believe that opening up the white spaces would have tremendous benefits not only for companies like ours but also for society in general. That’s why we’ve joined a broad coalition of public interest groups and companies in urging the FCC to “free the airwaves,” and why we’re appealing to you now.

The idea of easier access to less costly — or free — Internet sounds great. It also sounds like something the companies that have spent billions erecting wireless Internet networks will be unhappy about.

We only have to look as far as Verizon Wireless’s fight against Philadelphia’s free muni-Wi-Fi network. It argued that offering a free service that competed with its own 3G network was unfair.

Every other major network operator can make the same argument with respect to white spaces.

The FCC will be voting on the issue in the next month or two. The FCC is already seeing pressure from pols who believe in the idea. What will FCC Chairman Kevin Martin and Co. decide?

As regular readers may know, I’m limited to dial-up at home (or costly satellite) so I’m extremely interested in any possible technologies that’ll expand internet access. Especially when said access isn’t limited by the mono- / oligopolies of today.

White space. For some, the term might conjure up memories of art classes or visions of bad page layout. For a group of technology companies, it has a whole different meaning, one that could radically alter the broadband landscape in the US within a couple of years.

The White Spaces Coalition (WSC) is a group of companies devoted to making use of white space in the analog television spectrum to offer wireless broadband. It’s an impressive lineup: Microsoft, Google, Dell, HP, Intel, Philips, Earthlink, and Samsung are the group’s public members; there are also a couple of Coalition members who prefer to remain unknown. The group was in the news recently when it presented a device built by Microsoft to the FCC for testing.

The Coalition is making some strong claims, one of which should catch the eye of broadband lovers everywhere: download speeds of up to 80Mbps to our homes. All of this will happen by using the white spaces in the analog TV spectrum.

It sounds too good to be true, but you know someday we’ll look back at the internet access of today and think “WTF?” Kind of like paying $25 for AOL in the ’90s, or thousands of dollars for a cellphone the size of a brick back in the ’80s.

I think the technology is more than likely feasible; the difficulty will be getting past current (short-sighted + self-interested) internet providers.

Wow. Low cost 80Mbps internet. That’ll just be stupid.

More:
Free The Airwaves courtesy the heads at Google
Wireless Innovation Alliance
central FCC page concerning their ongoing testing
White space tests get mixed results via CNET

McCain Courts Kiddies While Obama (Needs To) Gets Dirty

Posted July 21st, 2008 at 6:56PM

John McCain hopes to convince a majority of people under 30 years old that he’s the best presidential candidate for them. So far, it’s not going well. Recent polls show Barack Obama with a lead of at least 20 percentage points.

“John McCain sees young voters as a competitive demographic this year,” said McCain youth outreach spokesman Joe Pounder, “and we’re going to go after them.”

To do that, the McCain campaign says it will focus on his legacy as a war hero, plus appearances on late night television shows â€” including Saturday Night Live â€” and town hall meetings around the country. He also has an army of thousands of young volunteers, thanks to Young Republican and College Republican clubs around the country connecting with peers over the phone and through canvas drives.
…
Those campaign methods look pretty traditional next to Obama’s presence on social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter. McCain has said he’s still learning how to sign onto the Internet himself.

Yeah, good luck with that. I can kind of predict already that Obama will still get a huge majority of the 18-35 demographic, nationwide. But McCain still has to go after the younger demographic, if only
for appearances’ sake. It’s the classic “go after them where they’re strong” tactic, a la Kerry’s swift boat vets. My main concern at this point is Obama relying too heavily on the “youth vote.” That supposed great voting bloc, rocking the vote and supporting the most progressive of causes every four years, has a tendency to skip out come election day (although the 18-35 segment did increase their turnout by 11% in ‘04, it simply wasn’t enough).

Democrats need to focus on the winning play book that Republicans have been writing over the past two decades. That means…

getting dirty (no, I’m talking dirtier than free bumper stickers from MoveOn),
amp up the pandering and fearmongering (the difficulty here is finding a feasible Other, given a progressive(ish) Dem platform),
going after the opponent’s strong points (debating a nonissue like flag pins draws attention away from actual issues, ie. potential weaknesses),
getting more support from the people who actually vote (older than 18-35, certainly).

I think by this point, after eight years of Bush (and eight years of Clintonian triangulation before), the ends justify the means. I’m never a fan of personal politics, but provided success both for POTUS and in Congress, the Democrats might be able to get something done after this election.

Bring on the cult of personality. Obama is personable enough. Maybe he should get a dog before the election.

Here’s a hopeful accompanying article re: the ‘08 primaries and the youth vote, from futuremajority.com.

Decision ‘08: iPhone 3G?

Posted July 9th, 2008 at 12:29PM

iphone

So the new iPhone is coming out this Friday, July 11th. I’m sure morons across the nation will be lining up early in the morning. I have no intention of joining them, but I do have this sort of irrational urge to purchase one myself sometime in the not-so-distant future (like, a week or two from now when I can just walk into the store and buy one). But I’m conflicted. Do I really need to trade in my prepaid, sub-$40, ratty and dog-chewed Nokia brick? I doubt the iPhone will be as durable in my dog’s mouth. But it’s pretty sexy. (…the phone, not my dog’s mouth.) The feature set is great, and more than that, the GUI and overall package is leagues ahead of the competition.

What particularly attracts me to the new iPhone is the much more reasonable $199 price tag (for the 8GB model) and the 3G compatibility. To this day, there are no alternatives to dial-up where I live – other than satellite, which is both expensive and lousy. But I actually get reception via AT&T / Cingular, and I’d be very interested in using the iPhone as a router for the home computer and laptop. My neighborhood isn’t 3G, but it is EDGE, which would still be quicker than 24kbps by all acounts. (Going down the road a mile, I’d probably pick up 3G too.)

Sounds like a plan? But consider that I currently pay about $100 a year with my current AT&T GoPhone prepaid account. I just don’t use a cellphone that much, and even the cheapest plan (what, $69 a month?) would be a lot more than what I currently pay.

Could I use the same prepay account and SIM card? I don’t know. There are plenty of people out there doing it, but with varying results. Would it be cheaper than just going with the $69/month plan? How long could I get away with using the phone for internet at home? I’ve read of “unlimited” data turning out to be a misnomer, at least for heavy users.

How well would it even work? Would it work at all?? *SHRUG*

Apparently AT&T has taken advantage of the new cheaper price by increasing their plan rates. But that aside, I think this redesigned iPhone is definitely a case of where being a “late adopter” has paid off. But just how late should I be to this party? Hmm..

Netflix Queue 12/11/07

Posted December 11th, 2007 at 12:38AM

I just finished another marathon round on Netflix. The site loads very slowly so I typically only go on and add to the queue in fits. Last time, about two months ago, I ended up adding dozens of old Japanese movies, mostly samurai-focused (only to determine that I don’t really enjoy most old samurai movies. Although I’d recommend Hiroshi Inagaki’s Samurai trilogy).

Even if the site is slow, I find it to be very adept at recommending movies. I will usually start somewhere concrete (say, The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai, which we own.. on Beta) and then branch out from there. Read the blurb, scan the reviews, check the date released, director, actors… and you have a good feel for whether or not it’s worth putting on your queue. And considering the amount of movies you can “rent” in a month â€“ practically anything is worth adding.

One movie begets two or three recommendations which you’ve forgotten or never heard of, and it continues to snowball, until you have twenty tabs open on your browser and your dial-up connection begins squealing in pain from all the bandwidth you’re asking for that it’ll never be able to deliver. At least, that’s what usually happens with me.

Tonight’s selections are varied. Some are classics I’ve never watched, some are classics I’ve forgotten. A lot are the sort of random, cult and b-movies that you’d never be able to find in your local area movie store. (If you’re lucky, you might be able to find some of them. On VHS. The original copies that the store bought. Totally unwatchable.)

And I’ll admit. Some on my queue are trash. Sometimes, if the reviews are just so bad, a movie has to be worth watching.

God bless Netflix.

Here’s my queue. Show me yours?

(Note: I used Albert Banks’ excellent Netflix plug-in to generate the list with links, and then I copy+pasted the generated html to create a tidy, static list.)

Sitting On The Hill, Looking Like A Lunatic

Posted May 8th, 2007 at 8:29PM

So the biggest downside to my apartment this year is the lack of internet. Occasionally last fall, we could snag a wireless signal from a neighbor, but winter caused that to end. And then, for awhile, it seemed like whoever’s signal it was, figured out how to mask it.

Today, I got adventurous, and tried to find the signal again. There was one spot on my porch, hidden from (nearly) all of the neighbors, where I could barely pick it up. But it was unusable. So, desperate, I climbed the hill behind our house. I didn’t go too far, perhaps ten feet up, and am now picking up the signal quite well. It’s buggy, and I fear that my display (or the illuminated apple on the back) is visible, but who cares. For now â€“ I’m connected once more!

Decline Of Memory; Creation Of A Collective Consciousness

Posted March 8th, 2007 at 12:24PM

This is my part of a larger collaborative project for my senior seminar writing class. ~~I’ll link up the full project when it goes live.~~

Donâ€™t bother remembering facts and figures, historical events and persons. The pedagogical norm of our school systems â€“ the regurgitation of facts in multiple-choice or short answer form â€“ is a disservice to the next generation. Today the collective memory of a thousand or ten thousand can be safely stored in a pocket, or held in the palm of a hand. A $50 flash drive contains more knowledge than Einstein could have ever possibly dreamt of. Individualism has been Americaâ€™s chief religion and ideology, but today we find ourselves moving closer and closer to a collective consciousness via technology and the internet. Today, it is not what you know that is important, but how well you can google.

Reality today is much stranger than fiction.

This technological collective consciousness is the result of technology which brings all together, to share and learn and feed off of one another in a symbiotic (albeit perhaps cold, impersonal) relationship. Todayâ€™s wiki is an exact example of this, but all of the internet can be included.

The internet was born out of a need to communicate better so that we could war better. This technology grew exponentially throughout the â€˜70s, â€˜80s and â€˜90s, in both scale and accessibility (and use and potential). From black and green DOS terminals to colorful point-and-click GUIs. From a token few researchers at certain technical institutions and the Pentagon to soccer-moms and their five-year-olds everywhere.

It has been said that Wisdom is the ability to understand others; it is the understanding of yourself that is Enlightenment.

Intelligence has, in the past, been measured by how much information one can retain. The pursuit of information, of knowledge. And then, following this, what one does with it â€“ the pursuit of understanding. With the internet and its (our) collective consciousness, infinite knowledge (for the purposes of an individual) is readily available and at our fingertips. It is unnecessary to remember because we can easily google for the fact or information in question. Long-term memory is superfluous, and should things continue as they are, evolution will reflect this.

Today, the pursuit of wisdom or enlightenment can (ought to) take center stage. Intelligence today can be measured in understanding. The ability to think critically trumps the ability to be a good Jeopardy contestant. Emphasis shifts.

Toward this end, society evolves: constantly, slowly. Todayâ€™s children navigate the collective consciousness with ease. The elderly, less so. As humanity ambles along, it becomes adjusted to the new realities. The people change first; structures (libraries, the schooling system, the media) follow. Whether humanity begets the reality or vice-versa is irrelevant (unanswerable). Change happens; it is.

If you submit to us now, we will train you to be free tomorrow.

Those without the means of logging on (technological, economic and even geographical barriers still exist) are left behind and outside. Outside, one has two options: to continue as before, spending time and grey matter harvesting knowledge through traditional (deteriorating) channels; or to amalgamate with the collective consciousness. The pursuit of knowledge is inefficient; amalgamation is self-destructive (the loss of individualism). But at least a choice is presented. For those born into the machine, no true choice is allowed. All of the structures we surround ourselves with today are hegemonic; they disallow deviance or alternatives.

Some attempt to control the madness, but there is no method here. Censorship or regulation has failed, or will fail. This pursuit is as futile as controlling an individualâ€™s thoughts or dreams. The consciousness is anarchistic.

The creation of a collective consciousness is also inevitable. It is the product of millennia of technological progress, culminating in a sort of â€œfinal solution.â€ Humanityâ€™s thirst for knowledge has given rise to a system that allows everyone to know everything. And this is as close to nirvana as humanity can hope to achieve.