Rubenerd

I’ve been overjoyed at the level of feedback and interest so many of you still have for portable music players.

Unbeknownst to me when I wrote my most recent post, there’s still an entire industry of what are now dubbed digital audio players, or DAPs. They’ve continued to evolve and add features since the iPod blitzed the industry and left with a whimper.

DAP manufacturers have (largely) conceded the general portable music market to the almighty smartphone, just as music stores are starting to with streaming services. I’ve said this was inevitable, though I don’t have to like it.

I was worried that the market solution would be mass-produced knockoffs, which admittedly has happened (just look at eBay). But manufacturers like Sony have continued to remain viable and even increase their install bases for music players by moving upmarket, and innovating with features even phones don’t have.

The biggest of these is high-resolution playback, and the kit to render them with high fidelity. FLAC files now regularly exceed the bit and sample rates of compact discs, and you can now play these on the go with good headphones. Reviewers compare the sound quality of the players based on their DACs, chipsets, and other circuitry, just as people reviewed hi-fi setups in years past.

Another very intriguing feature is their ability to be used as external USB DAC. This is brilliant; someone buying a DAP in 2022 is interested in sound quality, so giving them the option to improve output from their computer serves an additional need.

Had Apple continued to innovate rather than resting on its anodized laurels, I wonder if they could have continued to add meaningfully to this space as well? It’s interesting to think what a true 2020s iPod DAC would look like. Likewise, the moribund iTunes Store could have been upgraded with premium lossless files for those who don’t want streaming. They’re probably one of the few companies that could pull it off, assuming they got their interest in the pro and enthusiast markets back.

I’ve admitted here that I can’t tell the difference between a FLAC file, and a 320 kb/s MP3 encoded from the same source when performing a double-blind test, even with AKG monitors and a home hi-fi setup. But while I won’t be loading up a portable player with lossless audio files any time soon, it’s exciting to see such interest. It means people do still care about buying and listening to music, which is worth even more than extra bits.

Based on some feedback you all provided, I bought a modern Sony Walkman DAP recently, a review of which is coming soon. While I wait for it to arrive, I’m organising my local music collection in preparation for syncing with it. Music is fun!

Years ago I remember reading that backups must be automatic to be useful. As soon as you rely on a manual process to perform tedious but necessary jobs, our squishy human brains will forget, and we will lose data. In the words of chief engineer Thomas Andrews as portrayed in James Cameron’s Titanic, it’s a mathematical certainty.

(It’s funny that his quotes are all I remember from that movie, even after all these years. I assure you sir, she’s made of iron).

I’m starting to see parallels to this everywhere. And I take it a step further: something not quite as good, efficient, or even affordable still beats the pants off something manual, especially if one has a life outside that particular thing.

I’m not a financial advisor, and this is not financial advice! But the sagest words I’ve heard about investing came from Jim Kloss at a cute coffee shop in Philadelphia. Managed investment accounts with regular deductions you don’t need to think about are (probably) better, for the same reason as backups. You want to do these important things regularly, so why not use infrastructure that won’t forget, or will mess with it?

(For all their faults, I think this is why Australia’s compulsory superannuation scheme and Singapore’s CPF schemes are great ideas. How many more people now have retirement savings than would otherwise)?

I suspect when people think of automation, images of complicated Rube Goldberg machines or spaghetti code scrawling across a screen come to mind. But there’s so much low-hanging fruit.

The President of Ukraine:

The maintenance of attention cannot be stopped for a single moment. That applies to everyone. Every modern person is well aware of how the media works. It is very difficult to keep an eye on one topic for a long time.

This is unfortunately true, and especially so on the modern web.

For the attention to Ukraine, to our struggle, for freedom not to decrease, everyone must continue to talk about what is happening. Please share information. Support our needs. The more we say about Ukraine in the world, the sooner we’ll be able to end the war and liberate our land.

The President’s United24 initiative includes links for where you can send donations for defence, demining, medical aid, and reconstruction. Please consider if you can. 🌻

There are a few aspects of my personality and writing that I’m not proud of that I’m working to change. Seeing other people display them has been a mirror into how I do things too, and I don’t like what I see.

One of them is this verbal tick I’ve picked up where I describe something I don’t like as being the worst possible thing, and that people who like them are evil, or a variation on this.

It’s said in jest, but I feel like it’s one of those things that are harmless jokes… until they’re not. Even not accounting for Poe’s Law, it’s a well-worn and predictable progression from those who harbour benign views begin to believe their own parodies.

The ubiquity of such language also disarms it for people, events, and things that deserve it. The pen is mightier than the sword, but like any weapon it needs to be used strategically or it burns out.

Embellishment and rage get clicks, but that’s not my motivation for writing here. I’ve got this sort of writing wrong. I’ll do better.

I got into a lot of trouble last time I wrote a post with a title like this. Let’s tempt fate again!

We haven’t had a things you already know, unless you don’t post for at least a few months, so here’s something that still surprises some people.

Instead of doing this:

$ sudo vi ./file

You can do this:

$ sudoedit ./file

Safer, easier, better :).

From the manpage(8), the tool creates a temporary copy of the file, then invokes whichever editor you have defined in SUDO_EDITOR, VISUAL, or EDITOR. When you’re done editing, the temporary modified file is copied back to the original location.

I just learned about this computer from Jan Beta. This looks amazing!

CERBERUS 2080™ is a complete, innovative, fully-functional, multi-processor 8-bit microcomputer. Featured on HACKADAY, it is meant as an open-source educational platform for students of computer engineering and advanced hobbyists, supporting both the Z80 and the 65C02 CPUs. As such, it has been designed correctly, so to provide an appropriate didactic example. Unlike many hobby computers, CERBERUS is a self-contained system and rock-solid in terms of robustness and reliability. It’s also pretty darn fast!

For those who didn’t recognise them, the Zilog Z80 and MOS 6502 families powered most of the home computer revolution of the 1980s, including the likes of Apple and Atari. My Commodore 16 and Plus/4 have compatible variants of the 6502, and my Commodore 128 has both!

I already have a mountain of vintage and retro-inspired computer stuff on the desk next to me, but this looks amazing. This could be my entry into proper assembler and soldering kits that I’ve wanted.

I was a Beatles fan growing up, and Clara and I have been getting back into them of late. We’ve bought my favourite Abbey Road, Revolver, and their Magical Mystery Tour albums on vinyl, and are getting the rest on CD. Have you noticed some acts have even stopped selling those? That’s a topic for another time.

Today’s Music Monday is a review of a new album we picked up that I’ve rather enjoyed. As with McCartney and McCartney II, all the instrumentation, recording, and mixing was done by the man himself. It gives it a more realistic and less produced sound, and earned Clara’s admiration for his ability to play more than one instrument!

Winter Bird/When Winter Comes is our favourite:

This production method was panned when his original 1970 album came out, though I suppose one can’t divorce it from the circumstances surrounding its release. John had already quietly quit by the time Let It Be was released, but Paul broke the news. The timing of his first solo album, and the perceived lack of polish compared to the exquisite mastering of The Beatles left people with a sour taste of Apple. I can empathise, but I still loved it.

(It’s also interesting to compare to the others, especially George who’s Cloud Nine album is one of my all-time favourites, Ringo who’s solo output I feel is underappreciated for how much fun it is, and John who’s music I admit to being mostly apathetic about. McCartney’s solo work has a completely different vibe and attitude to The Beatles, which some have found difficult to swallow).

Today, there’s an entire culture around “lo-fi” music, and what Clara and I call “chill”. It’s probably why we love folk music; its good for the soul and anxiety. McCartney fits this bill, and so does McCartney III; though this album also has some great blues and rock-inspired tunes on side A.

This post was a bit all over the place, but if you have even a passing interest in these four gents from Liverpool, give McCartney III a listen. It’s made it on our regular rotation now in the evenings when we disconnect from the Internet and think of other things.

A doctor I follow on social media once commented that cleaners have saved more lives than medical professionals. Twitterers were quick to belittle the comment as being patronising to doctors, missing the fact:

• the statement was probably true
• the person making the comment was a doctor
• the statement didn’t invalidate the work medical professionals do

The doctor’s intent with the post was clear: she wanted to highlight the extraordinary and essential contribution that cleaners and other sanitation workers make to our society, and how their compensation doesn’t reflect either of these when compared to a well-paid doctor like herself.

Had people given it a moment’s thought… wait, aaaah, I see the problem.

I’ve read the argument that social media reduces people’s capacity for critical thinking. I’m on the fence about that, but I do agree that it encourages every thought and interaction to be reduced to binary. Maybe it’s because two thoughts can’t fit into 280 characters.

Claiming one thing is important doesn’t invalidate something else, even if used in a comparison. This is basic critical thinking stuff, like (not) sticking your hand in a boiling kettle, or using the tip of a Swiss Army Knife as a replacement for a tiny Torx screwdriver. Ask me how I know!

Here’s a Sunday mental exercise. Why can’t we ever buy a tub of Greek yoghurt in the right size? The options are either tiny tubs that last a few mouthfuls, or buckets so massive we’ll only ever eat half before it expires.

Simple economics doesn’t see a problem here. The bucket is five times the size, but only double the price! Who cares if you end up wasting half of it, you’ve saved money in absolute terms, and per gram.

Well, Clara and I care. I think it’s wasteful to buy food I’m not going to eat. I feels like I’m living in a Bizarro World needing to spell that out, yet here we are.

I’ve noticed a widening and accelerating trend towards smaller and larger food for a decade now. You either buy shrinkflated “fun sized” packets, or ultra super duper economy. That works for non-perishables like paper towels and canned soup, but I’m not going to buy a four litre value pack of stock, or a kilo of nutmeg because it makes economic sense.

Businesses don’t want to sell medium tubs of yoghurt. They make higher profits on tiny containers, and they push people to buy more with larger tubs. It’s why bulk discounts exist, even if the bulk of it festers in landfill.

Last year I confused a barista by only redeeming a small coffee. It didn’t matter that I’d never drink a large, we’re programmed to think we should extract the maximum value out of something. You don’t need to extrapolate this much further before you realise even “human resources” are treated this way.

We need to recalibrate the incentives here, or we’ll continue to waste the planet away for no (good) reason. It stinks; just as much as this stale yoghurt I now need to throw away because they were out of the tiny tubs.