Rubenerd

Sometimes when I can't sleep, I go back into the computer room and gaze at a machine doing something menial and textual for a while. I used to do this with the family DOS computer before I even started school; there's something about slowly changing characters on a screen in a dark room that's almost… hypnotic.

Memtest[86+] works, SpinRite is also a good one. Back in my Windows days it used to be ScanDisk. In any event, I just watch this Matrix-style stuff go by in slowmo for a short while, and I'm ready to try sleeping again.

Stop looking at me like that.

As a formerly obsessed aviation nut and a logo nerd, I felt compelled to comment on Virgin Australia's new brand design. Yes, I lifted that entire first sentence from my JAL blog post back in February, its called recycling.

Ruben just had coffee

Virgin Australia is the rebrand of Virgin Blue, the budget airline started by a consortium of Richard Branson and Australian investors shortly after the demise of Ansett in the early 2000s. Ansett was originally supposed to be sold to Singapore Airlines (imagine how awesome THAT would have been!) but instead was taken over by Air New Zealand and subsequently run into the ground. Well, I am aware planes land on ground and from the perspective of those watching in the airport it could be seen as running, though I believe that's a bit of a stretch. Now the DC-8-30, that was a stretch. But I digress.

Virgin Blue's rebranding entailed (hah, that's a bit of a pun) the adoption of the same slender typeface of their American and British operations, and a stark white livery in place of the awfully ugly yet colourful ironic red livery from Virgin Blue. Unfortunately owing to the parent company's part ownership by Singapore Airlines (those guys again!) for some reason this means Pacific Blue and the like can't also be called Virgin Pacific or something cool like that. Which makes no sense, oh well.

Virgin Australia pulled a Japan Airlines

As with Japan Airline's new livery in February, I have mixed feelings about this one. Like JAL, Virgin Australia has adopted a clean, minimalistic new livery which appeals to someone like me who likes clean minimalism. Well that sentence was redundant. So was this one. And this one. Brown sugar… how come you taste so good?

Where was I? Oh yeah, firetrucks. Did you know in airports they're often coloured yellow for visibility? So "Fire Engine Red" in this case would be… yellow. Funny story.

Anyway, yes, so while I do like the new livery from a minimalism perspective, and while I think the stretched lettering over the vertical stabiliser and down the rear of the fuselage looks rather fetching and unconventional, the lettering towards the front is in the same boring spot almost every airline puts it.

Virgin Blue, sorry Virgin Australia, prides itself on being unconventional in a non-threatening, conventional way, but this new lettering at the front is a missed opportunity. Which is a shame, because repainting planes costs a lot of money that could be spent on more of those little crackers and cheese they sometimes give you. Oh yeah, and A320s instead of 737s, they have far more room per seat.

What I’d really like

Despite those No Agenda folks who agree with more often than not, I do prefer trains to planes, and would rather travel on a high speed train between urban centres in Australia, though I know that will never happen because we live in a democracy where the people we elect are only interested in projects that generate short term political capital. The political capital of Australia in Canberra. I mean, what's the point of having long term plans if someone (or some party) other than you can take the credit for it later? Not that I'm cynical or anything. Planes are cylindrical, kinda.

Because really, Virgin Australia implies Australia had never had planes before. And she has. By comparison, she's never had true, regular, electric high speed rail before, so Virgin Australia would make far more sense for such a mode of transportation instead, right? I think I may have pushed that metaphor too far.

So Twitter is in the process of buying TweetDeck as well as UberMedia and Echofon, at least from what the intertubes are saying. Is their intention to assimilate every Twitter-related company out there so they have no competition and can force Dickbars on all of us?

As long as their API remains somewhat open I suppose we have nothing to worry about for now, but their confusing messages about developers and now this leaves me a little nervous. And my name isn't even Dick.

Another afternoon, another person appeals to me for help with their Windows laptop. Regardless of whether its a Windows XP, Vista or 7 machine, the problem is always exactly the same: viruses and spyware.

Steals some of his old man’s blood pressure pills

Since I was a kid I've been the go-to guy in our circle of friends and family for fixing computers, and I've done my fair share of them. Anecdotal evidence should always be taken with a grain of salt, but in my case the problem has been near universal. People treat their computers as appliances, download material without knowing what it is or where it came from, and treat the subsequent slowdowns as a fact of life. Almost every machine I've looked at has been riddled with spyware or viruses, and the problem simply isn't going away.

To quote my sister Elke who was a casual Windows user until 2008: "They're just used to it, its not unusual!".

Forgive any undue disrespect if you're a Microsoft guy or girl, but we've been hearing from many of you how secure Windows is now and how 7 is the greatest OS of all time. While I'm sure technical users have no problem keeping their systems running well, they're completely deluded if they think they're a typical use case.

Did I mention it’s fact?

Other OSs are by no means perfect, but despite their own specific limitations Macs or Linux boxes[1] I've looked at simply don't have these issues. Full stop. This isn't a case of unbridled fanboyism, its cold hard fact, and I wish Windows fans would simply admit it, just as a Mac user[2] I admit I pay a huge premium for hardware, or that my Linux boxes[2] have less (or far more complex) hardware support.

We can debate the reasons why (some of which aren't Microsoft's fault), but it's undeniable fact that in the hands of a non-technically proficient user Windows rapidly attracts junk and slows down like no other OS.

As a consumer operating system, the other issue is Windows is being pushed into places where it simply doesn't belong and is dangerous, such as ATMs, hospitals and critical process control systems, but that's for another rant post.

calms down drinks tea.

Footnotes

[1] Linux (or GNU/Linux, etc) is typically installed by a technically competent friend or family member, and I’m surprised by the number of them I’m encountering these days. It also lends a little credence to the notion that Windows market share is inflated, given that these machines were OEM-d with Redmond’s OS and are counted as such. That’s a topic for another post too.

[2] I grew on DOS and Windows machines right up to XP, but made the switch to Mac in 2001 and didn’t look back. I also maintain several PCs running Arch and Fedora Linux, and my file and media servers run FreeBSD.

[3] Nanami Madobe is adorable, as too is the new mascot for Azure. We need some official OS-tans for Mac OS X, Linux and BSD. We already have a platypus, a penguin and a daemon, but a team of *nix bishōjo characters shouldn’t be too hard!

Bruce Schneier just posted about the FBI taking control of botnets and disabling the infections remotely, and being giddy with excitement that I was one of the first to read it, I left a comment :D. I need a blue collared shirt.

Earlier this month, the FBI seized control of the Coreflood botnet and shut it down.

This is a big deal; it’s the first time the FBI has done something like this. My guess is that we’re going to see a lot more of this sort of thing in the future; it’s the obvious solution for botnets.

Leaving Coreflood in place could blow up some important machine. And leaving Coreflood in place not only puts the infected computers at risk; it puts the whole Internet at risk. Minimizing the collateral damage is important, but this feels like a place where the interest of the Internet as a whole trumps the interest of those affected by shutting down Coreflood.

The problem as I see it is the slippery slope. Because next, the RIAA is going to want to remotely disable computers they feel are engaged in illegal file sharing. And the FBI is going to want to remotely disable computers they feel are encouraging terrorism. And so on. It’s important to have serious legal controls on this counterattack sort of defense.

I share concerns about outsiders being able to remotely execute code on machines, but in this case if the targets are already infected with botnet software they're effectively already out of their owner's control and can't be trusted anyway. This is in contrast to the RIAA who's argument rests on the owner being complicit in the alleged crime(s).

That said, I agree with Bruce insofar as there must be strict legal rules about when such disabling can be executed. The first step may be to more specifically define what constitutes a botnet, given law enforcement and politicians barely even understand file sharing let alone Borg-esque hives of machines.

I also believe the argument that compromised machines affecting us all is a convincing one for Microsoft to allow patches of pirated copies of Windows.

When things are looking blue, what more do you need than Mugi, Azusa and Yui, having a sandwich hug? My favourite three characters!. I suppose some matching drive icons would also be in order… one step at a time ^^;

At %2011-05-01 04:13:04% Pacific US time, computers in the Schade family passed the 1,024 work unit mark on the Folding@Home protein folding project, with a current score of 337,848 and a rank of 33,008 of 1,543,174, or 2.13%. If work units were bytes, we'd be up to 1 kilobyte right now, that's some pretty sweet sugar right there ^^. Brown sugar of course, it's much nicer.

When I pass 2.00%, I'm going formally ask again if I can have my account changed from rubenerd to ForDebraSchade or something similar. You're not supposed to be able to, but I hope they'll grant an exception.

This show finally started exploring the idea behind dreams and how they affect us… which is why I started watching it in the first place! Yumekui Merry #09: "Disturbed Dreams" / "Yume Midarete".

After last episode which tended to lurch from adorable cuteness to more serious undertones, this episode consisted largely of the latter. Lots more detail, much less Merry eating a doughnut surrounded by angelic choirs of angels. Angelic chiors of angels, surprising though it may seem.

While being an unabashed fan of moeblob (and I really do mean that, people who claim the style is ruining the anime industry simply need not watch) I revel in shows that make me think, and while I must admit I was expecting Yumekui Merry to have a little more substance, this episode finally started to deliver it. Well, and that one scene above ;).

We pick up where we left of in the daydream state with Yui, her dream daemon Engi (complete with wings and ridiculously large bosoms), Merry, her dream colour-seeing sidekick Yumeji and the clownisly Commander Keen villin-esque Landsborough. That sounds like a brand of offroad vechile.

As Merry is about to deliver her spinning, highly coreographed kick arse blow that would make the likes of Sailor Moon jealous, he suddenly informs her of a reason not to. Engi attempts to take care of business, but is stopped by Yumeji once he himself understands the implications.

The pieces are all starting to come together. People's dreams are being intimitely researched, and armed with that information their hosts are being targeted and their bodies taken over for the next wave of mumas… and how its pulled off and who is behind it blew me away. I should have seen it from a mile away, and I'm kicking myself that they led me on for this long without putting the pieces together!

Yes, this is how long it took for me to get it Isana-san, shaddup! Coincidently this was also the point where I stopped reading the manga; albeit the anime and manga diverge significantly in places in terms of plot and introduced characters, but still, WOW. Kudos you schrewd devils ;).

A highly brief summary (well there goes my English degree, if I had one) but it leaves us to explore some of the interesting philosophical questions he raises that I was so looking forward to this anime delivering, just as I was excited to watch Inception! Dream words have always fascinated me!

Yui, stop distracting me!

The dream stuff

I'm quoting Ayako's fansubs here as I can't speak or understand Japanese ^^;. After confronting his foes, our offroad vechile brand-named dream daemon had this to say not about the perception humans have of their dreams, but of dreams on humans.

What attracts us to humans? The power to walk forward.

While dreams might seem perfectly random at times, they can only draw from our own previous experiences with people, places and events. Previous, right? So if there were dream daemons and they wanted to see the future rather than always living in someone's past (or a world influenced by past experiences) then they'd want to use humans as hosts to live in what they would perceive to be the future, right? Cool idea!

We leave on the thoughts of this otherwise evil character on what dreams do for people:

The courage to spindle your thoughts…
The hope that connects your thoughts…
The passion that moves your thoughts…
And the power to acheive…
A place where the heart becomes the most brave and the brightest…
Furthermore, its a place where they’re easily lost…

That's some pretty deep stuff right there, and I certainly attest to some of it. I would think it too easy to dismiss all our failings on our ability to dream, for one thing I doubt I could be a heavyweight champ by virtue of the fact I'm an anemic stick insect. At some point there are physical limitations that even our dreams cannot conquer. Or… can they? I suppose at this point we get into what constitutes a dream, and a limitation.

Needless to say, these quotes and the ideas behind the relationship between humans and dreems were pretty deep, but I think we have to go deeper. See what I did there?

My main criticism of this episode stemmed not from the plot, but by the sudden reversal of production values. In many of the scenes it seemed as though shortcuts were taken with drawing, and unless the characters were drawn right up close (I believe "closeup" is the cinematographic term, thank you Paul Simon) there was a tendancy to ignore even more basic detail. I've been told a similar phenomena occured with Gurren Lagann. Oh well, had the plot been crappy (and some say that it was, haters gonna hate) and the production values not so good, it would have been even worse!

That's not to say scenery wasn't still beautiful though. In anime, these are the shots that make me want to buy the Blu-ray discs when they become available.

Links shared from del.icio.us today:

IP Australia : Trade Marks

(categories: trademarks law business australia)

Trade Mark Application Process in Singapore

(categories: trademarks law business singapore)

Peace

Great news, particularly for my American friends who lost loved ones on September 11th, 2001. I can still remember heading into school in Singapore reading the paper and not being able to believe my eyes.

President Obama fulfilled one of his promises tonight, but US forces are still in Afghanistan and Iraq, and they need to leave. I hope this is the next step, so we can all try to put this ugliness behind us and end these pointless wars that have killed hundreds of thousands of people. We also need to thoroughly repudiate the draconian reversals of our basic human rights imposed in the name of alleged security. Only then can we all move on and do justice to the victims.

Truth

Unfortunately, despite the good news on the surface, part of me is tempted to think of this as a distraction and an example of security theatre. If the American government has lied to us at any point about bin Laden and the extent of his involvement in terrorism operations, there must be an investigation and those covering up must be held accountable. No exception.

I don't believe September 11 was a false flag and that those who allege it was are oversimplifying a very complex issue of geopolitics, but there is something more going on here and I don't think we're all being told the full story. American forces have been in Afghanistan and Iraq for longer than the duration of World War II and it took them far too long to find him. Why?

If it's uncovered that politicians used the death of civilians to advance their agenda, the American government owes the world the truth, as does the Australian and British governments for going along with it.

I'd say I'm cautiously optimistic this afternoon, but with some reservations.

Response

Barack Obama's response is on the WhiteHouse.gov website. The MP3 link is broken, presumably because the same URL was copied from the MP4 video including the "_HD" text. Removing that from the URL points to the right file.

• President Obama on Death of Osama bin Laden
• Download MP4 (333MiB)
• Download MP3 (9MiB)

Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong's response:

SINGAPORE – Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said that while “it’s a good thing Osama bin Laden is dead” – the terrorist mastermind having been killed by American forces this morning – Singaporeans should be reminded that there are larger threats beyond our shores, even as Singapore engages in political battles during this period.

There was allegedly a plot to blow up the American, British and Australian high commisions and embassies in 2001 too. They're all located one next to each other.

Prime Minister Julia Gillard's response:

Prime Minister Julia Gillard says the death of Osama bin Laden comes as a “small measure of justice” to the Australians who have lost family members in terrorist attacks.

But she has warned that Al Qaeda is “not finished” and Australian troops still have work to do in Afghanistan.

1. True.
2. Crap.