storage of information

From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DNA

The main role of DNA molecules is the long-term storage of information

Some random (semi)inebriated thoughts on the flow of information and the futility of continued attempts to profit from it:

• Information subverts control


• Information subverts hierarchy


• There seems to be a relation between the increase in entropy and information - the less able our universe is to to do work, the more we seem to know about it


• We are ourselves products of the free exchange of the information stored in our DNA - limiting this flow of information, for example through in-breeding, has detrimental effects such as a higher frequency of recessive, deleterious traits


• Attempts to stem the flow of information for any reason are probably an anomaly


• This tends to suggest that ultimately all information should be shared, freely


• Secrecy and privacy are an illusion


• Information is not owned, it is only exchanged.


• Gatekeepers of information hold a precarious position - information by it's own nature strives to be shared by all


• secrets are just information that is temporarily shielded from de-centralised systems of information exchange


• Profiting from restricting the flow of information through controlled pipelines is temporary


• Sharing information freely is priceless


• Enabling individuals to exchange information freely should be more valuable than attempting to restrict it's flow to those who pay to access it (such restrictions can only ever be temporary)

Girls claim to want a guy with a good sense of humour...

...but always go home with his better looking mate.

This photo of Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniac,



reminded me of this billboard poster:



(sorry about the crappy photo, my camera phone sucks)

My sense of humour is often remarked upon. Admit it, which guy are you?

OmniFocus sync to a generic WebDAV server

This in from Ethan Schoonover of The Omni Group:

Just wanted to note that we've built OmniFocus sync so that you can use either an existing .Mac membership or a generic WebDAV server (often much cheaper than a full .Mac membership). We've also added the ability to sync via a disk so you could also use a USB thumb drive, for example.

Yay! Now that's what I'm talking about.

Genetically pre-disposed to be susceptible to advertising

Testicles are proof! From http://www.nyu.edu/classes/neimark/evolution.html

...in any encounter in animals where advertisement is important--and that's very, very often--an advertisement is only believed if it's validated by being costly.

Translated into English, what the male is saying is, `Look how powerful a male I am, because I can afford to wear my balls outside my body, in the most vulnerable position. You'd better not mess with me because I am proving my strength and my ability as a fighter.'

Photo by 512 Photography - CC Attribution

BitTorrent for legitimate file distribution

Over 1MB/sec, with zero load on the software vendor's servers.

Cloud Computing

Was just thinking about how much I love cloud computing, and how some people are still opposed to the idea.

The advantages as I see it are not having to store countless GB of data on your own computer, and being able to access your data anywhere. Not to mention leveraging the huge computing grids it's hosted on to perform CPU intensive operations like searching your data.

The disadvantages I think are moot, namely that an active internet connection is required to access your data. To draw an analogy, I think it would have been like arguing against the introduction of the motor car by saying they're only useful wherever there are paved roads.

Internet access will become ubiquitous. The limiting factor is bandwidth. Using the motor car analogy again it's like the number of lanes limits the traffic bearing capacity. It will be a long time before we can store our entire digital libraries online, but for now I'm happy keeping my media locally, and my email, RSS feeds, notes, and bookmarks online.

OmniFocus gets sync... soon

From http://blog.omnigroup.com/2008/05/09/omnifocus-sync-its-alive/

Sounds like sync is already in the internal test versions of OmniFocus. I had tried messing around with Automator scripts and rsync to no avail. The first out of Omnifocus and Things to get full synchronization will be the one I'll start using again at work. It will most likely depend on .Mac membership which I'm disinclined to pay the $130 or so per year for.

Perspectives: contexts vs tags

I had recently switched from OmniFocus to Things for a trial comparison of the 2 main GTD apps for Mac. I have a purchased copy of OmniFocus, but was finding it a little frustrating trying to track multiple home & work related projects, and using it as a system you can trust to store ideas and someday/maybe tasks using only a single context to identify each task.

After using Things for a few weeks now it feels like a breath of fresh air. It's tagging system is very simple, but incredibly powerful. I love being able to process my tasks and quickly move a bunch to the Today focus, and then using the tag filter further refine my next actions down to either general work/home related tasks, or a specific context.

It also has a strong someday/maybe and scheduled concept. Tasks in the Someday focus don't vanish completely, but appear in a collapsed section beneath your active tasks. Scheduled tasks automatically move into the Today focus on their scheduled date.

I'm also loving the Projects and Areas features. Projects can have tags which automatically apply to any tasks added to them, but can also be assigned to an area such as Work or Home. For me it's more in keeping with the GTD definition of a project being any action that requires more than one step to complete. OmniFocus on the other hand left a lingering feeling of hierarchical structure makes tasks less accessible.

Anyway, there's a perspectives screencasts video for OmniFocus out that made me think how much it points out the difficulty in accessing tasks in Omnifocus.