2DLED Dipping a toe back into drawing with an illustration of a light emitting diode. I’ve been having some thoughts that I might use pen-and-ink illustrations in a basic electronics coursebook, so I gave it a try with a relatively easy subject. If this is going to be a series
More blogging, more doing, less bloviating [wprevive_async zoneid=”1″] The WordPress migration has gone pretty smoothly, but there’s a lot of stuff that needs to be fixed. Some of that has been related to the differences between WordPress and Drupal, but more has needed to be fixed for some time but I’m just
Facebook: the social distance network Social media existed before Facebook. Social media even existed before blogs. Or at least the term social media existed before the term blog. Wikipedia has a list of criteria (lifted from an academic paper behind a firewall else I’d cite or quote it here) but today I’m less
Fifty-two books in 2021 In 2005 when my blog was on LiveJournal, I participated in the 50bookchallenge [https://50bookchallenge.livejournal.com/] group, attempting to read fifty books in a year. When I switched to WordPress in 2008 I found a WordPress plugin for a challenge to read fifty-two (books) in fifty-two (weeks). I liked
I'm sorry, Drupal. We should spend some time apart. I’m sorry to leave Drupal. I really am. Drupal has powered Monochromatic Outlook for about 15 years, and I’ve done a lot with it. I still have a few other sites running Drupal and I don’t expect to immediately migrate them. At the same time it’s
Broken promise I used to make it a point to write a post for America’s Independence Day. It was an exercise in affirming what it means to me to live in America. I’ve let that go over the past few years for a variety of reasons. I just haven’t
Facebook There's no idle gossip in braille A recent Medium article [https://onezero.medium.com/we-dont-need-social-media-53d5455f4f6b] suggests that it doesn’t matter whether Facebook is broken up, or implements radical changes, or is replaced by a different platform. The author, Colin Horgan, says that it’s not necessary at all. He is partly right. He’s right
90 minutes without my phone Scott Berkun [http://scottberkun.com/] retweeted a challenge suggested by Mike Davidson [https://twitter.com/mikeindustries] today: to see how long one could go without one’s phone. The idea intrigued me — conventional wisdom says that these devices are distracting and corrosive to sanity. Also, I didn’t want to
If downloading was free everyone would be doing it Part two in a series of two or more of topics relevant to the Network Neutrality debate I’m shocked that I need to explain this, but prices are determined by supply, demand, and sellers’ decisions about the best ways to optimize supply and demand. Over time they are determined
Internet «Unlimited» is fraud Part one in a series of two or more of topics relevant to the Network Neutrality debate Imagine a pizzeria. Let’s call it Monochromatic Pizza because that’s a terrible name for a pizza joint1 and with luck I won’t anger the proprietors of any actual pizza places.
Abuse A gold shield is not droit du seigneur Call me cynical, and I hope I’m wrong. My prediction: two NYPD detectives will lose their jobs but see no jail time for the rape of a teenager they arrested, a crime to which the detectives confessed [http://nypost.com/2017/09/29/teen-shocked-nypd-detectives-claimed-sex-acts-were-consensual/] . Now the attorneys for the
Is there life after snowflake? I’m going to start with a brief quote from Cory Doctorow’s novel Walkaway. The character has left “default” society to go live in an anarchic post-scarcity outpost. Think year-round Burning Man but not the endless party aspect, the autonomous zone aspect. > “I feel like I’m going
SJW Listen, snowflake. Star Trek has always leaned hard to port There’s a new Star Trek series premiering tonight on CBS. Already Twitter is awash1 with critics complaining that Star Trek is no longer Star Trek, that it has turned into a propaganda vehicle for the «social justice warriors» who are pushing an anti-American, pro-globalist, diversity-loving agenda. See the IMDB
iOS 11 Six hours with iOS 11 Today is release day for iOS 11, Apple’s newest version of the operating system for iPhones and iPads. This is not news. As of about 1pm Eastern time, the update is available for download and installation on supported devices. Monochromatic Outlook sacrificed an iPhone1 [javascript:void(0)]My iPad
Drupal Drupal, maybe we should just be friends Recently I finished reading a book and went to put the book in my blog. I don’t have the book report written but wanted to at least get a placeholder in the database with the vital statistics: title, author, word count, my rating, and so on. After entering the
Freedom is the freedom to say that fewer is fewer United States President Donald Trump signed a presidential memorandum [https://web.archive.org/web/20171210061747/https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2017/01/23/presidential-memorandum-regarding-hiring-freeze] 1 today instituting a hiring freeze on Federal civilian workers [http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powerpost/wp/2017/01/23/trump-freezes-federal-hiring/] . White House Press Secretary Sean
I hope you're right As the old chestnut goes, there are three tiny words that every marriage needs to be successful. I’m not talking about I love you. I mean, maybe you’re right. We are on the precipice of a highly divisive election. I fear that the nation is facing an existential
2016 Election The New World Order Series Back in 2008, Barack Obama made a comment comparing the longshot odds of an African-American winning a presidential election to the odds of the Boston Red Sox winning the World Series.1 Famously, the Red Sox had won in 2007 for the first time since… well, OK, since 2004. But
What's in an alien name? An oft-discussed topic among writers of speculative fiction, both science fiction and fantasy, is how to name characters, places, and ideas of extraterrestrial or otherwise non-human or alien origin. Naming is a difficult part of all fiction writing — it’s more difficult than one might think to make names for
2016 Election Chinese Steel Apologies to Dee Dee Ramone and Johnny Thunders [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=57nPAqBPGPE]. Also, apologies to heroin addiction. Being compared to the 2016 US Presidential Election is unflattering even to heroin addiction. Somebody called me on the phone I defaulted on another loan No big deal! Wanna cop
Status update: I didn’t expect it to be that much downtime Whoops! OK, that was my fault. I was actually quite surprised at how smoothly and quickly the transition went. As it turns out, it appears to have taken longer than expected for the DNS to update. In fact, the problem may have been in DNS cached in my browsers. When
Status update: some downtime expected As Monochromatic Outlook prepares to celebrate its 21st anniversary, we are preparing to transfer the splicer.com domain to a new registrar. This is a pretty simple administrative change, but it’s quite possible that there will be some time between the change in registration and when the new registrar
Infrared Inhaler I posted a write-up of my Infrared Inhaler [https://positronic.works/infrared-inhaler/] project over at Positronic Works [https://positronic.works/].
2016 Election Lies, damn lies, and thirteen and a half percent statistics It’s unclear why anyone is surprised by Bernie Sanders’ tax return [https://go.berniesanders.com/page/-/Bernie%20Taxes%20Full.pdf]. The outrage appears entirely manufactured built on distortions and an assumption that no one will check facts.1 Senator Sanders’s tax filing is simple, easy to read,
Separating the presumably wiser adults from the relatively inexperienced younger individuals without specifying any gender identity for the purposes o Pop quiz for self-described Republicans, Libertarians, Conservatives, and Classic Liberals.1 What is your first thought when you see this headline from an article in today’s Wall Street Journal? PayPal Cancels Plan for Facility in North Carolina, Citing Transgender Law [http://www.wsj.com/articles/paypal-cancels-plans-for-operations-center-400-jobs-over-north-carolinas-transgender-law-1459872277] Choose the one
