Oct 7, 2011 
I had just gotten home from work on Wednesday night, when I read this tweet from my friend and fellow Apple fan Andrew. It was certainly a surprise, to the point where I initially doubted it (or perhaps hoped it wasn’t true), but the stream of traffic from my tech-oriented Twitter feed made it fairly clear that Steve Jobs had died. This news affected me more than I expected.
Collected Commentary
Browsing the archives for the me tag
1 Comment Set course for Marriage Prime, Love Factor 6: I asked Andrle H. Pence to marry me, and she said yes! Woohoo!
This all went down the Wednesday before last (July 7th, or 7-7-2010… seven might be her favorite number…) while we were visiting a friend’s cabin in northern Minnesota.
Now, below the cut, some (goofy) photos of us on the dock where I proposed under the stars…
Last weekend I attended my five-year reunion at Swarthmore College. I graduated in 2005, and it was my first time back on campus since I attended the 2006 graduation to see off friends from that year. I think I had somehow forgotten how beautiful the campus is (being a national arboretum will do that).
Campus hasn’t changed much since I left; the Parrish remodel I had seen in 2006 makes a much nicer first floor lounge, New New Dorm is in place next to New Dorm (where I lived senior year, now called Kemp and Paul respectively), and the arboretum building got expanded. The newest trees planted around the science center (which was completed my senior year) have grown a fair bit. The napping couch in Hicks (the engineering building) was reupholstered. Otherwise, the campus is a very familiar place.
My sense of calling Swat home really struck me Sunday morning, as several of us met up to go to brunch at Java Joe’s. Since my parents moved to Seattle, I haven’t had a sense of permanent home. There’s not much tying me to Minneapolis other than high school friends I visit occasionally, and while my parents are associated with home, their current condo is largely unfamiliar. It probably also doesn’t help the sense of home there that my sister is still far, far away! I like Boston a lot, but I don’t feel Bostonian in a number of key ways. Swarthmore, however, is where I spent a good chunk of four years of my life (almost straight through in the last three years, since I did summer research twice). Now that I’ve been back, I can see myself returning more often, if for no other reason than to keep an anchor there; conveniently however I can expect to see a lot of old friends every time I go.
A more detailed rundown of the weekend is below the cut. Overall it was great to see everyone, but the official events were pretty lame. Apologies if I left anyone out!
Best. PAX. Evar.
PAX East was my third Penny Arcade eXpo, and in many ways my best… but as others have addressed, also an unfortunate reminder of how hard it is to manage a convention hall full of geeks, nerds, dweebs, and all the rest. The whining has been handled by others, and I have a positive attitude and had a great time in spite of the logistical problems, so I’m not going to talk about those problems much.
For me, the two huge differences were location (that the event was local to me, in addition to not involving a visit to my parental units in Seattle) and people (in addition to more random run-ins, I spent most of the con with my old roommate Fritz and my girlfriend Andrle, as well as bringing my Little Brother on Sunday). Since it was a much more social event for me, I didn’t enter any gaming tournaments (as I did both of the last two PAX Primes, even placing in RoboRally last year and winning a PAX medal), nor did I attend any sessions (in part due to line issues).
As per my usual, I caught Paul and Storm and Jonathan Coulton in concert (the 6th time I’ve seen them play live!), as well as the opening act with the Video Game Orchestra. Like last year (but unlike my first year at PAX ’08), I watched the keynote by Wil Wheaton and the final round of the Omegathon (the third round of which was in this case was the opening for the Saturday night concert).
As always, amusing nerd-watching, interesting demos, tons of free crap, and good times gaming. A few pictures, some game and product comments, plus my concert videos, below the cut.
What’s the question?
Like every other critic and salivating fanboy, I feel compelled to chime in on yesterday’s religious experience in which The Steve descended from on high bearing a tablet. However, this is not a review, but merely a (lengthy) answer to a simple question: is the iPad for me? I won’t be talking about the market for digital content distribution, I won’t be whining about what software and hardware widgets weren’t included, I’m not going to rant about Apple’s closed ecosystem, I won’t be begging to lick someone’s boots for a chance just to touch one. Additionally, although hopefully this is obvious, this is heavy on speculation, since I have yet to actually hold the product, let alone use it for any length of time.
I’ll also take this opportunity to brag that I got 29.5 points on the prediction score card, with only one question as yet unanswered: will textbooks be available (I said yes, and I think this is eventually likely, based on the list of publishers involved). I was briefly unsure if my existing Apple Wireless Keyboard would be supported, but the Design page indicates that in will be, in spite of the existence of the iPad Dock. I got the name right, and most of the detailed features based on the rumorsphere. The substantive places I was wrong were the absence of a camera, the price point (cheaper than I expected), and the lack of any information on iPhone OS 4. I had a hope for an open development environment, but I knew that wasn’t going to be true, so that’s more a self-docking principle point. I failed to predict the dock, and I gave myself a half-point for saying no 3G when there are models both with and without.
Below the cut I’ll start off with a brief history of my personal electronics habits from college through today, and then consider where the iPad would fit into my little niche… and, if it does fit, whether it’s worth it. I’ll also look at what still-open questions about the device would affect my potential buying decision (not the least of which is that I need to try it out in an Apple Store to get a sense of the ergonomics). While I’m only speaking for myself, maybe my analysis will be useful to people similar to me.
I will be in Mali for the next two weeks, coming back late on the 19th. My sister’s wedding is on the 16th. I expect to have minimal-to-no internet access during that time, so you probably won’t hear from me via e-mail, Twitter, or otherwise.
Introduction
At home, I use Safari 3 (the Safari 4 beta is as yet too hideous to behold). At work, I use Google Chrome 2 (yes, the beta). Both browsers feature an autocomplete, although Chrome uses the more advanced “awesomebar” style where history, bookmarks, and web search are merged together. I tend to use this autocomplete more than I go to my actual bookmark menu, although my most frequent sites (that aren’t in my “check all the time” start bookmark group) are on the bookmark bar as well. More on that later.
This meme idea is from this post over on Ellie Mirman’s blog; she’s a HubSpot employee that I’ve run into a few times at Boston-area tweet-ups. It’s pretty simple: type each letter of the alphabet into your primary browser’s address/awesomebar, and post a link to the URL that comes up as the first item. I’ve also noted whether the URL comes from a bookmark, the bookmark bar, or my history. The “start bookmark folder” refers to pages that are in my “default window”, i.e. the pages I always have loaded (and reload regularly). After the list I have some quick trivia stats about this list.
A to Z – Home
A: http://www.amazon.com/ – I shop at Amazon a lot (Bookmark Bar)
B: http://blog.ultranurd.net/ – My blog (History)
C: http://www.curseforge.com/ – I develop WoW mods using their site tools (History)
D: http://del.icio.us/UltraNurd – I apparently still have the old URL (Bookmark Bar)
E: http://www.eecs.harvard.edu/ – I take classes part-time, and most assignments are posted online (Bookmark Bar)
F: http://www.facebook.com/ – I’m on ur facebooks, posting on ur walls (Start Bookmark Folder)
G: http://www.guildwebpage.com/phpBB2/index.php – My World of Warcraft guild, Mellonea (Start Bookmark Folder)
H: http://www.hulu.com/ – Mostly from watching Battlestar Galactica (History)
I: http://www.imdb.com/ – I regularly google movies, TV shows, and actors for trivia (History)
J: http://jwz.livejournal.com/ – I read his LJ for weird links, music, and interesting tech questions (History)
K: http://www.kirintorroleplay.com/forum – General forums for roleplayers on my World of Warcraft server, Kirin Tor (Start Bookmark Folder)
L: http://www.livejournal.com/users/ultranurd/friends – While I use Google Reader for blog-reading, I have many friends who are primarily on LiveJournal (Start Bookmark Folder)
M: http://mail.yahoo.com/ – My first e-mail address, my Yahoo! account is for spam absorption (Bookmark Bar)
N: http://news.google.com/ – My primary source of current events coverage (Start Bookmark Folder)
O: http://www.okcupid.com/ – Yes, I’m an online dater; maybe someday I’ll post more on my experiences there (Bookmark Bar)
P: http://www.penny-arcade.com/ – Arguably my favorite web comic (NSFW); I’ve even been to PAX (Bookmark)
Q: http://q10.livejournal.com/ – A friend of mine from college; I believe all their posts are locked (History)
R: http://www.radioparadise.com/ – My favorite internet radio station, and primary source of new music (Start Bookmark Bar)
S: http://www.shadowpanther.net/ – The best guide for World of Warcraft rogue class loot lists (History)
T: http://www.twitter.com/UltraNurd/followers – This is usually how I find new people to follow, what tools do you use? (History)
U: http://www.unbroken-guild.com/ – Our allied World of Warcraft guild, Unbroken; mostly social and related to our raiding exploits (Start Bookmark Folder)
V: http://www.vgcats.com/ – Another really good video games web comic; even more so NSFW (Bookmark)
W: http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/ – This should surprise no one (Bookmark Bar)
X: http://www.xkcd.com/ – Usually hilarious geeky web comic (Bookmark)
Y: http://www.youtube.com/ – I’m sure I watch multiple videos a day (History)
Z: http://www.zendrum.com/ – I think I posted a link to this instrument used by Jonathan Coulton a few weeks ago? (History)
Quick Stats
- I only overlap with Ellie on 4/26 (15%). How much do you overlap with me?
- 3 of these links are web comics
- 6 of these links are WoW-related
- 4 of these links are places where I maintain my public internet persona
- Only 1 of these links is “transient”, that is a site I don’t expect to return to any time soon (the Zen Drum)
- My best estimate is that I consistently use 16 of these sites daily; the remainder (except the one transient) I probably check at least once every few weeks
Nicolas Ward
Software engineer in Natural Language Processing research by day; gamer, reader, and aspiring UltraNurd by night. Husband to Andrle
