1 00:00:03,000 --> 00:00:10,440 The Power of Source Code 2 00:00:10,440 --> 00:00:19,540 Yeah, hi everybody, it's Source Code. It is Saturday, August 21st, 2004. I'm Adam Curry. 3 00:00:19,540 --> 00:00:27,240 Saturday afternoon in Curry Castle in Belgium. It's about 3.36. How's that for an approximate time for you? 4 00:00:27,240 --> 00:00:35,360 Sorry about yesterday. No postings on the blog and no source code. It was just way too crazy. 5 00:00:35,360 --> 00:00:39,760 During the radio show in the morning, as you know, we're winding down. 6 00:00:40,160 --> 00:00:44,500 One more week to go and then two more days to finish up the month and that'll be all over. 7 00:00:44,500 --> 00:00:50,920 We had the Chanuk crew who flew us in Iraq. 8 00:00:50,920 --> 00:01:03,020 They flew us from Camp Smitty to Basra. 9 00:01:04,500 --> 00:01:07,620 a final two or three hour drive from there to Kuwait on our way home. 10 00:01:07,620 --> 00:01:12,080 And we also did some night goggle vision reconnaissance flights. 11 00:01:12,080 --> 00:01:13,300 So anyway, they came by. 12 00:01:13,300 --> 00:01:17,400 They wanted to see where we worked since we'd already seen their area of responsibility. 13 00:01:17,400 --> 00:01:20,300 It was a good time, but tiring nonetheless. 14 00:01:20,300 --> 00:01:22,700 From there, I went straight home. 15 00:01:22,700 --> 00:01:29,940 There was someone who almost arrived immediately for an interview, which was, of course, all 16 00:01:29,940 --> 00:01:30,300 set up. 17 00:01:30,300 --> 00:01:34,100 But I keep forgetting I really don't like doing stuff on Friday afternoons. 18 00:01:34,960 --> 00:01:41,120 And then on top of that, some folks who had seen the house earlier in the week came back, 19 00:01:41,120 --> 00:01:41,920 wanted to see it again. 20 00:01:41,920 --> 00:01:43,520 This time they brought the entire family. 21 00:01:43,520 --> 00:01:49,420 And I got a call earlier this morning that they are coming back again on Monday. 22 00:01:49,420 --> 00:01:50,680 So that looks good. 23 00:01:52,500 --> 00:02:03,780 I don't know if you remember, two days ago I mentioned that Crystal, my assistant, had... 24 00:02:03,780 --> 00:02:06,760 I'm not quite sure where she got it from. 25 00:02:06,760 --> 00:02:16,460 She got one of these Pinnacle Systems Show Center, which is essentially a video device that you hook up to your television. 26 00:02:16,460 --> 00:02:18,840 I have it hooked up to our big Grandmaster View screen here. 27 00:02:19,660 --> 00:02:23,980 It has a Wi-Fi card, so it talks to your Wi-Fi environment. 28 00:02:23,980 --> 00:02:32,860 And it sits there basically listening for a show center server, which I'm not quite sure what protocol it speaks. 29 00:02:32,860 --> 00:02:35,500 It may be Windows Media Server, I'm not sure. 30 00:02:35,500 --> 00:02:42,100 But that has to run on a Windows machine, so I still have an old Sony VAIO laptop with Windows 2000. 31 00:02:42,100 --> 00:02:45,840 Loaded it up, and lo and behold, it's working. 32 00:02:45,840 --> 00:02:49,500 First of all, regarding the... 33 00:02:49,500 --> 00:02:50,040 the setup 34 00:02:50,040 --> 00:02:51,420 the wifi setup 35 00:02:51,420 --> 00:02:52,000 is stupid 36 00:02:52,000 --> 00:02:53,060 you have to fill in 37 00:02:54,000 --> 00:03:00,420 name, a network name, and it comes with a show center as the network name installed 38 00:03:00,420 --> 00:03:03,280 standard, which makes no sense because, of course, that means everyone's going to have 39 00:03:03,280 --> 00:03:03,960 to change that. 40 00:03:03,960 --> 00:03:08,760 Either you have to change your Wi-Fi network name or you have to figure out how to change 41 00:03:08,760 --> 00:03:15,280 it on the show center device, which means you've got to reboot, hold down the B key. 42 00:03:15,280 --> 00:03:17,940 I mean, this is all stuff that is just not easy for people. 43 00:03:17,940 --> 00:03:19,740 I think it should work like my laptop does. 44 00:03:19,740 --> 00:03:24,640 When I walk in range of a new Wi-Fi network, it says, hey, should I add this? 45 00:03:24,640 --> 00:03:25,720 Do you want to connect to it now? 46 00:03:25,720 --> 00:03:28,140 That, of course, is the way this should work as well. 47 00:03:28,140 --> 00:03:33,840 So basically, you create a database in the show center software on the PC. 48 00:03:33,840 --> 00:03:41,680 Of course, just like a share program, like a peer-to-peer program, if you want, it'll 49 00:03:41,680 --> 00:03:45,960 go through your entire disk and pull up all kinds of media files. 50 00:03:45,960 --> 00:03:48,360 So that works pretty straightforward. 51 00:03:48,360 --> 00:03:49,360 And it's basically... 52 00:03:49,360 --> 00:03:52,240 Basically, you have three bins, music, movies, photos. 53 00:03:52,240 --> 00:03:53,960 You can create playlists from them. 54 00:03:55,500 --> 00:03:58,160 is the files that it will accept. 55 00:03:58,160 --> 00:04:00,800 Let me see. 56 00:04:00,800 --> 00:04:01,800 I think I have... 57 00:04:01,800 --> 00:04:06,980 Here, it does tell me which files it'll accept. 58 00:04:06,980 --> 00:04:08,760 Hold on. 59 00:04:10,500 --> 00:04:23,840 mp3 windows media audio wave file jpeg png gif mpeg1 mpeg2 divx avi version 5 plus 4 plus 5 60 00:04:23,840 --> 00:04:33,540 simple profile remember that is x video avi simple profile dv avi windows media video video files 61 00:04:33,540 --> 00:04:39,080 also must all contain audio data well so apparently there's a quite a difference between 62 00:04:39,080 --> 00:04:46,860 avis and avis because some really i had this huge bucket of bit torrent downloads which 63 00:04:46,860 --> 00:04:53,740 are either mpegs or avis and some of the avis do work on the show center if you put it in a 64 00:04:53,740 --> 00:05:03,160 windows media video it converts it to a vcd file you know so it's a little bit disappointing that 65 00:05:03,160 --> 00:05:08,700 you just don't know exactly what is going to work or not and if you should convert prior to 66 00:05:08,700 --> 00:05:10,260 putting it into this database 67 00:05:10,260 --> 00:05:12,000 or if it 68 00:05:12,000 --> 00:05:13,720 will do it by itself. It's very unclear. 69 00:05:13,720 --> 00:05:17,960 Something it does have that's pretty cool is you can 70 00:05:17,960 --> 00:05:19,820 set up a folder to be watched 71 00:05:19,820 --> 00:05:21,860 and the minute you drop 72 00:05:21,860 --> 00:05:23,840 anything into that folder, automatically 73 00:05:23,840 --> 00:05:26,080 it will be added to the database and then 74 00:05:26,080 --> 00:05:27,900 from the control center, the show center 75 00:05:27,900 --> 00:05:29,740 in the living room, which has a remote control, 76 00:05:29,740 --> 00:05:31,920 makes it nice, you can already 77 00:05:31,920 --> 00:05:34,100 a little light pops on saying new media 78 00:05:34,100 --> 00:05:35,820 and you go to the new media menu 79 00:05:35,820 --> 00:05:37,540 it will show up and it will play. 80 00:05:37,540 --> 00:05:39,900 Essentially when you select new media to be played 81 00:05:39,900 --> 00:05:41,560 it's being streamed across 82 00:05:41,560 --> 00:05:43,020 my Wi-Fi network. 83 00:05:43,020 --> 00:05:45,140 So I'm going to play with it a little bit more 84 00:05:45,140 --> 00:05:47,740 and I'm interested to see how 85 00:05:47,740 --> 00:05:50,060 Tricia, my wife, and Christina, our daughter 86 00:05:50,060 --> 00:05:51,060 how they pick it up 87 00:05:51,060 --> 00:05:54,020 and how they use it and I'm putting mounted 88 00:05:54,020 --> 00:05:55,940 volumes on their 89 00:05:55,940 --> 00:05:57,840 computer desktops so they can just 90 00:05:57,840 --> 00:05:59,500 drag and drop stuff in there as well. 91 00:05:59,500 --> 00:06:01,580 So we'll see what happens. It'll be cool. 92 00:06:01,580 --> 00:06:06,880 Right. 93 00:06:06,880 --> 00:06:09,860 I told you that I've been reading 94 00:06:09,860 --> 00:06:11,120 ... 95 00:06:11,120 --> 00:06:13,500 That would be big quotation marks. 96 00:06:13,500 --> 00:06:15,740 Michael Crichton's Timeline. 97 00:06:15,740 --> 00:06:17,880 The reason why I say reading 98 00:06:17,880 --> 00:06:19,740 is because I've been listening to it on audiobook. 99 00:06:19,740 --> 00:06:22,260 I actually just finished it yesterday afternoon 100 00:06:22,260 --> 00:06:24,260 on my drive home, sitting in some extra traffic. 101 00:06:24,260 --> 00:06:28,020 So I even was able to finish up 102 00:06:28,020 --> 00:06:29,440 the last 25 minutes I thought 103 00:06:29,440 --> 00:06:31,760 I wouldn't be able to listen to during my drive home. 104 00:06:31,760 --> 00:06:34,060 Great book. 105 00:06:34,060 --> 00:06:35,000 Really enjoyed it. 106 00:06:35,000 --> 00:06:37,260 14 hours worth of audio. 107 00:06:37,260 --> 00:06:40,020 And I got an email from Dave Weiner. 108 00:06:40,020 --> 00:06:41,420 Let me just pick that up here. 109 00:06:41,420 --> 00:06:46,440 FYI, I've become a member of audible.com 110 00:06:46,440 --> 00:06:47,780 and am reading 111 00:06:47,780 --> 00:06:49,520 Timeline now as I drive. 112 00:06:49,520 --> 00:06:50,620 He's driving across country. 113 00:06:50,620 --> 00:06:53,480 It's a very nice, if somewhat paranoid, service. 114 00:06:53,480 --> 00:06:55,880 I guess he's referring to... 115 00:06:55,880 --> 00:06:58,380 He could be referring to the book or to audible.com. 116 00:06:58,380 --> 00:07:00,200 Thanks for the tip in your audio blog post. 117 00:07:00,200 --> 00:07:02,220 Next stop, St. Augustine. 118 00:07:02,220 --> 00:07:02,780 Dave. 119 00:07:02,780 --> 00:07:03,220 Okay. 120 00:07:03,220 --> 00:07:06,460 So there's something interesting. 121 00:07:06,460 --> 00:07:08,560 I was talking about the audiobook. 122 00:07:08,560 --> 00:07:11,400 I think what I even said is... 123 00:07:11,400 --> 00:07:15,000 Gee, wouldn't it be cool if I could attach one of those DRM 124 00:07:15,000 --> 00:07:21,860 protected audio files, because Audible.com uses the AAC, Apple, DRM, can't copy me stuff. 125 00:07:21,860 --> 00:07:26,160 And if you tried to open it in iTunes just by double clicking it, it would then say, hey, 126 00:07:26,160 --> 00:07:31,240 you know, you want to buy this book? Looks like Adam referred it to you. Of course, they have a 127 00:07:31,240 --> 00:07:38,340 number, it's DRM, so they know that I bought it. And maybe they could give me two bucks for selling 128 00:07:38,340 --> 00:07:44,040 another copy, because I think it goes for, I don't know, it goes for at least $10. What I want to do 129 00:07:44,040 --> 00:07:49,880 today, though, is share with you a little piece from that book, a monologue, which I found very 130 00:07:49,880 --> 00:07:59,840 interesting and very applicable to perhaps the reason why we have weblogs today. Now, if you're 131 00:07:59,840 --> 00:08:05,420 reading this book still and don't want to hear any parts of it, then you should probably not listen 132 00:08:05,420 --> 00:08:11,900 to this. It's definitely not a spoiler, doesn't mess you up at all about the plot or the outcome 133 00:08:11,900 --> 00:08:14,020 of the book. But it's a monologue by one of my friends, and I'm going to share with you a little 134 00:08:14,020 --> 00:08:16,500 one of the characters and he's basically doing 135 00:08:16,500 --> 00:08:24,860 a pitch for this vision that he has, which is irrelevant, but listen to the theory behind 136 00:08:24,860 --> 00:08:25,300 the pitch. 137 00:08:25,300 --> 00:08:30,380 Now, of course, since this is an AAC file, I can't open it in any other application but 138 00:08:30,380 --> 00:08:30,840 iTunes. 139 00:08:30,840 --> 00:08:33,080 I tried to open it in QuickTime, didn't work either. 140 00:08:33,080 --> 00:08:38,260 So I can't open it into my recording application, so I'm going to have to put the mic down on 141 00:08:38,260 --> 00:08:42,760 the speaker so that I can start up iTunes and you can listen to this. 142 00:08:42,760 --> 00:08:45,540 This is about three minutes, but it's a very interesting thing. 143 00:08:45,540 --> 00:08:47,040 Hi. 144 00:08:54,000 --> 00:08:56,560 He walked back and forth across the stage. 145 00:08:56,560 --> 00:09:01,640 Today, everybody expects to be entertained, and they expect to be entertained all the time. 146 00:09:01,640 --> 00:09:08,140 Business meetings must be snappy, with bullet lists and animated graphics, so executives aren't bored. 147 00:09:08,140 --> 00:09:13,240 Malls and stores must be engaging, so they amuse as well as sell us. 148 00:09:13,240 --> 00:09:18,680 Politicians must have pleasing video personalities and tell us only what we want to hear. 149 00:09:19,000 --> 00:09:24,580 Schools must be careful not to bore young minds that expect the speed and complexity of television. 150 00:09:24,580 --> 00:09:29,320 Students must be amused, everyone must be amused, or they will switch. 151 00:09:29,320 --> 00:09:32,780 Switch brands, switch channels, switch parties, switch loyalties. 152 00:09:32,780 --> 00:09:38,360 This is the intellectual reality of Western society at the end of the century. 153 00:09:38,360 --> 00:09:44,960 In other centuries, human beings wanted to be saved, or improved, or freed, or educated. 154 00:09:44,960 --> 00:09:47,560 But in our century, they want to be entertained. 155 00:09:48,340 --> 00:09:52,680 The great fear is not of disease or death, but of boredom. 156 00:09:52,680 --> 00:09:55,440 A sense of time on our hands. 157 00:09:55,500 --> 00:10:00,000 a sense of nothing to do, a sense that we are not amused. 158 00:10:00,000 --> 00:10:03,800 But where will this mania for entertainment end? 159 00:10:03,800 --> 00:10:09,240 What will people do when they get tired of television, when they get tired of movies? 160 00:10:09,240 --> 00:10:11,180 We already know the answer. 161 00:10:11,180 --> 00:10:17,700 They go into participatory activities, sports, theme parks, amusement rides, roller coasters, 162 00:10:17,700 --> 00:10:21,660 structured fun, planned thrills. 163 00:10:21,660 --> 00:10:26,280 And what will they do when they tire of theme parks and planned thrills? 164 00:10:26,280 --> 00:10:30,380 Sooner or later, the artifice becomes too noticeable. 165 00:10:30,380 --> 00:10:37,880 They begin to realize that an amusement park is really a kind of jail in which you pay to be an inmate. 166 00:10:37,880 --> 00:10:41,860 This artifice will drive them to seek authenticity. 167 00:10:41,860 --> 00:10:47,580 Authenticity will be the buzzword of the 21st century. 168 00:10:47,580 --> 00:10:50,120 And what is authentic? 169 00:10:50,120 --> 00:10:51,600 Anything. 170 00:10:51,600 --> 00:10:54,520 Anything that is not devised and structured to make a profit. 171 00:10:54,520 --> 00:10:57,000 Anything that is not controlled by control. 172 00:10:57,000 --> 00:11:04,760 corporations, anything that exists for its own sake, that assumes its own shape. But of course, 173 00:11:04,760 --> 00:11:10,820 nothing in the modern world is allowed to assume its own shape. The modern world is the corporate 174 00:11:10,820 --> 00:11:17,740 equivalent of a formal garden, where everything is planted and arranged for effect, where nothing is 175 00:11:17,740 --> 00:11:27,440 untouched, where nothing is authentic. Where, then, will people turn for the rare and desirable 176 00:11:27,440 --> 00:11:38,460 experience of authenticity? They will turn to the past. The past is unarguably authentic. 177 00:11:38,460 --> 00:11:47,500 The past is a world that already existed before Disney and Murdoch and Nissan and Sony and IBM 178 00:11:47,500 --> 00:11:47,720 and Amazon. 179 00:11:47,740 --> 00:11:55,000 All the other shapers of the present day. The past was here before they were. The past rose 180 00:11:55,000 --> 00:11:58,500 and fell without their intrusion and molding and 181 00:11:58,500 --> 00:12:00,640 selling. The past is 182 00:12:00,640 --> 00:12:02,980 real. It's authentic. 183 00:12:02,980 --> 00:12:04,560 And this will 184 00:12:04,560 --> 00:12:06,560 make the past unbelievably 185 00:12:06,560 --> 00:12:08,180 attractive. 186 00:12:08,180 --> 00:12:10,280 Well, that's 187 00:12:10,280 --> 00:12:11,820 probably about enough of that. 188 00:12:11,820 --> 00:12:14,840 And hopefully it sounded okay through my 189 00:12:14,840 --> 00:12:18,660 air-based audio bridge. 190 00:12:18,660 --> 00:12:20,540 So I thought that was just an 191 00:12:20,540 --> 00:12:22,040 interesting bit of monologue. 192 00:12:22,040 --> 00:12:24,560 One about how people were going to look for 193 00:12:24,560 --> 00:12:26,860 reality. And maybe that's what weblogs 194 00:12:26,860 --> 00:12:28,640 bring if you subscribe to that 195 00:12:28,640 --> 00:12:30,840 type of vision. That weblogs 196 00:12:30,840 --> 00:12:32,520 bring a sense of reality. Or 197 00:12:32,520 --> 00:12:34,720 multiple weblogs can triangulate 198 00:12:34,720 --> 00:12:36,600 reality. And the whole 199 00:12:36,600 --> 00:12:38,160 bit about the past, who knows? 200 00:12:38,160 --> 00:12:40,380 Maybe that's what archives are all about. 201 00:12:40,380 --> 00:12:43,560 So what else? 202 00:12:43,560 --> 00:12:44,680 um... 203 00:12:46,500 --> 00:12:52,040 iPodder update, the application that turns your iPod into an audio MP3 aggregator. 204 00:12:52,040 --> 00:12:56,380 So the current status is you fire it up manually. 205 00:12:56,380 --> 00:13:01,400 It sucks in about six different feeds and updates your iTunes. 206 00:13:01,400 --> 00:13:04,000 And if you have it, an iPod automatically. 207 00:13:04,000 --> 00:13:13,440 I'm going to be working on the next release where there will be a separate text file sitting in the iPodder folder. 208 00:13:13,440 --> 00:13:15,160 And that's going to be your subscription file. 209 00:13:15,300 --> 00:13:22,660 So all you do is basically just add a new line with a URL to it to any MP3 enclosure feed with MP3 files. 210 00:13:22,660 --> 00:13:27,320 And it'll automatically run through that file as well. 211 00:13:27,320 --> 00:13:31,320 It'll parse it and download the enclosures when you run the iPodder application. 212 00:13:31,320 --> 00:13:35,840 After that, so that'll probably be about release beta 06, 213 00:13:35,840 --> 00:13:45,180 I hope to just have some form of installer that sets it all up for you and runs the program at a set interval. 214 00:13:45,180 --> 00:13:47,100 with one configuration file 215 00:13:48,000 --> 00:13:49,560 And you never hear from it again. 216 00:13:49,560 --> 00:13:52,640 It just keeps running automatically at the intervals that you set. 217 00:13:52,640 --> 00:13:56,740 And I think I mentioned in the previous show 218 00:13:56,740 --> 00:13:58,420 that it looks like some developers out there 219 00:13:58,420 --> 00:14:00,840 are working on their own versions. 220 00:14:00,840 --> 00:14:02,940 Some Python stuff. 221 00:14:02,940 --> 00:14:04,260 I'm looking forward to that coming out. 222 00:14:04,260 --> 00:14:06,100 Please, make this better than I did. 223 00:14:06,100 --> 00:14:08,680 Let's see. 224 00:14:08,680 --> 00:14:10,000 That's about it. 225 00:14:10,000 --> 00:14:10,340 Let me see. 226 00:14:10,340 --> 00:14:11,380 I've been at this for... 227 00:14:11,380 --> 00:14:11,940 How long are we going to talk? 228 00:14:11,940 --> 00:14:12,580 14 minutes? 229 00:14:12,580 --> 00:14:13,680 Okay, no song of the day. 230 00:14:13,680 --> 00:14:17,640 Besides, enough copyright violation with that bit from the timeline audiobook. 231 00:14:17,640 --> 00:14:22,880 But I'm going to go fill up the server with some more content. 232 00:14:22,880 --> 00:14:26,320 See if I can now connect the bridge on that 233 00:14:26,320 --> 00:14:30,100 so that if a new video comes in as a torrent, 234 00:14:30,100 --> 00:14:31,080 bit torrent file, 235 00:14:31,080 --> 00:14:34,920 it's downloaded and then automatically dropped into this watch folder 236 00:14:34,920 --> 00:14:37,200 on the Windows PC server 237 00:14:37,200 --> 00:14:38,900 so that we can then watch it in the living room. 238 00:14:38,900 --> 00:14:40,140 Wow. 239 00:14:40,140 --> 00:14:41,900 It's kind of like when I was a kid. 240 00:14:41,900 --> 00:14:44,700 The RadioShack 101 projects. 241 00:14:44,700 --> 00:14:46,700 Just need to have a red wire, a blue wire, 242 00:14:46,700 --> 00:14:47,620 and a nice long yellow. 243 00:14:47,620 --> 00:14:49,500 one and it'll all work. 244 00:14:49,500 --> 00:14:50,800 Okay, everybody, that's it. 245 00:14:50,800 --> 00:14:52,640 I'll talk to you tomorrow. 246 00:14:52,640 --> 00:14:52,960 Bye. 247 00:14:52,960 --> 00:14:53,000 Bye.