The Fry Side

I thought this was an interesting take on a different kind of use for an iPad.

Person: My mother. 62. Queen of the Luddites.
Computer proficiency: Absolutely none.
Will she be getting the iPad? Yep. The 16GB 3G model.
Why? My mom has never owned a computer. She doesn’t have an internet connection. She couldn’t explain to you what Facebook is. And she refers to my iPhone as “that information device.”

Given all this, I was quite surprised when she said she’ll be getting one right away. But then it made perfect sense. My mom hates computers because the icons are so small and the various program UI’s are relatively confusing (remember, she’s a 62 year old woman who still clings to her VHS tapes). My mom never saw the value in getting a computer and subscribing to a $30 monthly internet service when computers were always hard for her to use (she never really understood the mouse moves the cursor on the screen thing) and the only thing she would really use the computer for would be email.

For her the iPad is perfect. It’s not small like the iPhone, so she can see everything on the screen without squinting. Because my mom is a light internet user (think email and Skype), the $15 pay-as-you-go 250MB 3G price plan is perfect for her – especially since she can cancel at any time. She doesn’t have to sign a $30 a month contract and has no modem to worry about dying on her. But, the real appeal about the iPad is there is no mouse for her to fuddle with or cursor to follow. With the iPad, when she wants to check on her email, she simply touches the screen. My mom has poor sight but the iPad is both large enough and features a simple enough UI that she can touch to email with ease.

Best of all, when she isn’t checking her email, the iPad will double as a digital picture frame. My mom loves her photos and has recently gotten a digital camera. But with no computer, she’s had to take the camera card to Walgreen’s to get the pictures printed. Now with the iPad and the camera connection kit she can bypass a computer entirely and view her photos as never before.

I hadn’t thought of the iPad as a device for the non-computer user before, namely since it requires a computer to sync up to. However, it seems more self-contained than even an iPhone, so it could work. And besides, when there’s an update or other things to put on it, usually it’s the computer-savvy relative helping out anyway, why not just plug into their computer and fix everything there? I can see this.

Yet still a big issue is the backlit screen versus e-ink (as pointed out later in the article). E-ink is easier on the eyes, so hopefully there are some good screen settings in there for those of us who would use it as a newspaper most of the time.

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• …? #
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• Sorry if you've been having any issues with this weekend's audio file. I'm trying a new HTML5 plugin. It's working now. #

For Austin, who is learning about lots of amazing composers, including Igor Stravinsky.

Danse infernale de tous les sujets de Kastcheï – The Firebird – Stravinsky

Warren, I told you his school was good. They’ve also covered Gershwin and John Williams this term!

From January 16th. My kids are just plain adorable. Cheese!

Look, I have a computer just like Mommy.

Working hard on something. Probably turning it on and off, over and over.

Hi Big Brother!

I probably just told him he couldn’t play video games for another four hours.

Want to know why so many people around the world hate America? Here’s why:

‘Nuff said, as they say.

Here is a grand idea from Professor Bainbridge about how to get nuclear power going again in the US.

The Navy already operates dozens of small nuclear reactors in aircraft carriers and submarines, with an outstanding record of safety and reliability. They have an established training program that churns out nuclear-capable officers.

By analogy to the Army Corps of Engineering, we could create a Navy Corps of Nuclear Engineering. It would build and operate dozens of small nuclear power plants around the country.

To address security concerns, the first plants would be built on military bases, where the garrison can provide security. Licensing costs would be cut because the government would own and operate the plants.

The proposal should not offend small government sensibilities. Nuclear power is rife with market failures (and government failures). Huge research and development costs associated with traditional large scale nuclear power plants may be beyond the ability of private firms to finance. In addition, we know that private firms tend to underproduce the sort of basic R&D necessary to develop new generations of power plants. But the Navy already spends money to develop new naval reactors, which presumably could be scaled up at reasonable costs. Since the Navy need not worry about earning market competitive rates of return on its investment in R&D, moreover, there’s no economic disincentive to conducting that sort of R&D in the Navy.

(Found via The Daily Dish | By Andrew Sullivan.)

I thought this was great. Small power plants at military sites means the technology gets used, they don’t use fossil fuels, our defense not only stays off the grid but can now offset some costs by selling leftover power to the grid.

Now all we have to do is upgrade the damn grid.

Here is Andrew Sullivan’s immediate take on Tuesday’s Don’t Ask Don’t Tell hearings:A Question Of Integrity

Gates’ statement had all the usual Gates touches: a commitment to objective, calm, and professional review. And it has a plea to outsiders not to overly politicize this by using soldiers and their families as pawns in the debate. The bottom line is a 45 day review to make sure that the current policy is being applied fairly and a year-long review to examine every aspect of this proposed change.

But Mullen’s statement was a stunner. He did more than endorse this long process of inquiry and debate and to ensure that the current policy is implemented more fairly – so that anyone with a grievance against a gay servicemember can out him or her and end his or her career.

The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff stated before Congress that he personally believed the policy violated a core principle of the US military: integrity. He said that requiring servicemembers to lie as part of their duty to their country violated their integrity as soldiers and the military’s integrity itself. He said, in other words, that the current policy is dishonorable. I agree with him.

He remains open to competing arguments and data as this process goes forward, as he should.

But as of now, he believes the Clinton policy violates the integrity of the US military. I don’t think you could be much fairer than this approach and although I remain impatient for an end to this ban, I also believe it is only responsible to develop a careful plan to implement it and to ensure that the core task of the military, gay and straight, remains the defense of this country and its interests around the world.

Now let’s do what we can to keep the debate calm and reasoned and civil. Mullen and Gates set a tone the rest of us, on both sides, need to follow. Because lasting reform will become impossible without it. And servicemembers, gay and straight, deserve to be able to do their job with this matter finally behind them.

[emphasis mine]

Can’t help but hope, no?

So yes, last week saw the unveiling of Apple’s iPad. Now, as usual, I’m about a week behind on when something actually happens. But here are my initial thoughts when it comes to where the iPad could be useful.

First I had to think about when I would use such a device. Currently, I work in front of a laptop and a desktop, then I can take the laptop home and use it to look up recipes and email people as well. Plus I’ll have all my favorite tools and programs at my fingertips.

I have no commute. I drive less than 10 miles, sans errands, to get myself and my kids where we need to go. And I can barely listen to the radio in that time because decent music is few and far between and the news would spark too many awful questions from my six year old.

Plus I recently decided to ditch my iPhone for a simpler way of life. I’ve yet to sell the stupid thing, but that’s a digression. So I’m not feeling any loss for not having a digital reading device on me at all times.

So right now, I wouldn’t buy an iPad. Neither would my wife, since it couldn’t play any of her flash-based diversions, nor handle her online classes.

But I would have picked one up by my second year of college for one reason: textbooks. It’s yet to be seen whether Apple has this in the works, but as I see it, if you can make interactive textbooks that are half the price and can be produced without the costs of printing, then you win. Plus, nobody could buy used books since they are a one-shot purchase.

So for the price of $500 and the cost of textbooks cut in half, then you can pretty well see the device paying for itself in a year. I sure would have liked to tote around an iPad rather than huge, awful books. With an iPad to be my dictionary, quick reference, and full textbook, as well as my own handwritten notebook for the sake of building my memories more deeply, it would have worked well.

Another huge piece that would have been a gift to me would be a sheet music reader. That would be a tricky piece of software to come up with, since it would need an auto-scrolling feature. The screen is smaller than a letter-sized piece of paper, which is usually smaller than standard sheet music. But if I kept it all, scanned in images at the very least, with the ability to annotate as I needed, then it’d be quite useful indeed.

I also keep seeing it, if there is a sheet music app, as a pit orchestra with little glowing pieces of music rather than relying on crappy stand lights.

These are all big ifs, but I can see it as very possible. I think a big part missing is a stylus that could really absorb handwriting, even if it couldn’t transcribe the handwriting into plain text. Then you could write notes all over your books and music without affecting the primary source.

The tricks I describe would probably also depend on whether multi-tasking on the device is allowed. We shall have to wait and see.

I’ve been reading a lot more. I knocked out Prisoner of Azkaban in just about a week. This week I read Sun Tzu’s The Art of War. Now I’m back onto Machiavelli after taking a break from it to read a couple of novels (and to catch up with my niece who is reading the Harry Potter series for the first time).

The speed reading is definitely coming along, I think. My retention is higher. I’m getting closer to my goal of reading about a book a week, plus I’m able to consume more delicious content online. Hopefully that’ll make up for the fact I can’t listen to podcasts any longer since my kids keep getting louder.

So here are a few lines from The Art of War that struck me. From Chapter 2, Waging War:

3. If the campaign is protracted, the resources of the State will not be equal to the strain.

6. There is no instance of a country having benefited from prolonged warfare.

Chapter 3, Attack by Strategem:

18. If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the outcome of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.

Chapter 13, The Use of Spies:

4. What enables the wise sovereign and the good general to strike and conquer, and achieve things beyond the reach of ordinary men, is foreknowledge.

5. Now, this foreknowledge cannot be elicited from spirits; it cannot be obtained inductively from experience, nor by any deductive calculation.

5.1 If it weren’t for my horse, I wouldn’t have spent that year in college.*

6. Knowledge of the enemy’s dispositions can only be obtained from other men.

27. Hence it is only the enlightened ruler and the wise general who will use the highest intelligence of the army for the purposes of spying and thereby they achieve great results. Spies are the most important element of warfare, because on them depends an army’s ability to move.

That all spoke quite a bit about what has happened in the world in the past decade, and even so about the Cold War as well. Who would have thought that actual, evidential knowledge would be useful in conducting war?

*Not actual quote from Sun Tzu.

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