One of my favorite books of last year was Neil Stephensen’sThe Diamond Age: Or, a Young Lady’s Illustrated Primer. Long story short, the story hinges on this nearly magically computerized nano-whazzit book thing. The book dynamically changes as the protagonist grows older, tailoring its message to help her develop into a fine leader of mice…or something. Look, I can’t do it justice…just read it.
I read that book first on my Kindle, then finished it on my iPhone after the Kindle died an unfortunate death. At the time, I felt that I was a little nearer to that world of an actual smart book.
Looking at this recent video from Penguin books, it looks like the iPad will take us a bit further down the road.
Additional videos get a little more high-level, talking about how best to deliver content rich books. Use the ePub format that iBooks and most of the book world (excluding Amazon) uses or create “Apps”. ePub can support linking to external sources, pictures, and some other simple features, but lacks the ability to bring this really slick stuff to devices. Enter Applications-as-books. Up shoot, you can make it much smarter, more dynamic, and richer. Downside, this is a bit more complicated then converting a text file to be read by a machine. Also, they would need to go through the Apple App Store, which is pretty incredible but can chafe some developers.
Who knows where this will go. I don’t. But I think it will be pretty cool.
Why don’t restaurants that insist on having flash sites have atleast a link to an html only version. Or at least list their hours on their google listing.
80% of the time I am looking for a site I am on my phone. The other 20% I get angry at their non-indexed flash pages.
Week 28. We can expect our little bandit to be about 2.5 pounds, be dreaming, and other stuff like that.
I know that, because every Tuesday morning we checkout our little pregnancy app on our iPhone. Pregnancy Pregnant, has a few neat features and few that are kind of puzzeling.
It has weekly updates on the kiddo, from two perspectives. A nice “baby” update and some detailed and frankly weird “Mother” side. The Mom’s side seems to be badly translated Chinese. There are wacky folksy type comments. But for most part, both are interesting and seem to track along with books we have read.
A selection from the Mother section today was:
A word of wise for would be fathers, believe it or not, research has shown if the mother wants to keep on breast feeding the baby and the father wants to support her, but yet do not know anything about this….Then….Well, what are you waiting for!
I don’t know what I am waiting for, but….then…well….
I personally like the quirks and the app is keeper. Would recommend it for other soon-to-be parents.
Apparently, nothing captivates the mind of the public like the image of big dude (let’s just call me the 1/8th of a ton miracle) jogging.
Oddly, I have had a lot of questions about this. So here are some answers (which is lame for me because know when I stop jogging in two weeks to pursue my hobby of not finishing things, people will know).
I am follow a program called Couch to 5k. Long story short, it is a progress jogging plan that incrementally increases the intensity of the workout until you are clipping along like an Gazelle on the African Plains. The first few weeks seem really easy, short jogs with walks. This is to give my might legs time to recover and prevent me from following my usual fitness MO of hurting myself right of the bat. Overtime you end up running for a full 30 minutes, which can cover a lot of ground. This program isn’t for a seasoned runner, but excellent for someone just getting into running or returning from break.
I don’t do well jogging on machines, so I hit the streets in my neighborhood. This seems to make time go by faster and gives me a really nice familiarity with where I live. The downside, at least this time of year, is the cold. Because, dang. It is coooooold. Haven’t had to deal with Rain yet, stay tuned on that front.
I like to listen to podcasts when I jog, mostly because it makes the time go by faster. NPR’s Radio Lab is my favorite for awesome science based news stories. But hey, go with what you like.
I use a Nike Plus Sensor* for the joy of seeing some metrics on my improvement. For those not in the know, Nike Plus is a sensor that you wear that tracks the number of strides you make along with the time between strides, and creates an estimated distance traveled and calories burned. There is a lot more science and engineering behind it, making it much more than a supped pedometer, but that is for another post. My sensor interfaces with my iPhone and synchronizes with my computer when I get home. There are version that don’t require iAnything.
You can track your results on the Nike + site, which look like this:
Nike + Runs
Although you can track me on my profile site, if you are a weirdo:
I used my iPhone (like I do from pretty much everything in my life) along with a neat application called “Couch to 5k”.
Couch to 5k Screen:Week One, Day One
It gives you audio and tactile alarms when you need to either run or walk.
That’s the gist of what I use when I do my thing. I am strongly considering ditching my running shoes and get something else less cushy. I spend most my time in flip flops and barefeet, feels weird being so cushioned.
* – Link for Nike Plus Sensor goes to Amazon, buy there from this link and I get a small cut which I will use for nefarious purposes.
Twitter
Facebook
Flickr
RSS
arently, nothing captivates the mind of the public like the image of big dude (let’s just call me the 1/8th of a ton miracle) jogging.
