One year ago today: May 26, 2013, a spirited post.
Five years ago today: May 26, 2009 no comment.
This is a clipped but representative picture of the opening screen of a typical 3D design application. For some technical details, see today’s addendum. But the practical details are this is the type of cluttered nonsense you can expect from even the most advanced design packages. Just on this opening view, I counted 95 different selections, options, radio buttons, settings, controls, and default items. There were six other choices for this view, but I didn’t dare peek. This, world, is the best the top minds of our century can come up with. And I could not find any information on which printers this software was compatible with. Tread carefully.
[Author's note 2019: the following makes more sense if you realize I was trying to take some on-line tutorials on remote setup. Instead, I got a series of characters who demanded to know why I wanted this information. I finally said screw it.]
On that point read my lips: anybody who accuses others of having something to hide themselves is covering up something. I wonder what it will turn out to be on that guy? I always check the background of whomever is dirty-minded enough to think so evil of others, particularly of stranger of whom he knows nothing—and I’ve never been wrong yet. I can’t help being naturally curious whenever I find something the other guy doesn’t want me to know or worse, tries to discourage others from learning. What are they up to? If I can learn to get to Seattle on $612, I can figure out what this guy is up to.
Another element of last week’s Nova meeting was discussed, it was the concept of where to begin. I took my ROM display in, clearly stating twice before beginning that this was not a robot part. It was, rather an example of the level at which building a robot had to begin. This was in direct response to how, at the previous meetup, people were encouraged to do computer code without any discussion of whether or not they had a clue about robotics. I would like to be the one to inform Nova that robots are built from the ground up, and that fancy simulators are one minor part of the process. And not even a necessary one at that.
Sure enough, somebody in the room brought up the lame point that we cannot start building at “the nano-level”. I guess they missed my statement that I was not showing a robot part, or worse and scarier, heard me but didn’t want to understand what I had just said. Such snarky comments are made to demean, not inform.
It was all I could do to mention that ground-up was a better approach than top-down, but an earlier show of hands had already indicated the majority of the room was far more interested in constructing a robot than playing computer games and tossing around neuro-terms. That was another cue that got somehow missed. I looked at the code screens of what had been covered in class and none of it made any sense to the novice. Even the person running the code did not understand the meaning of the numbers flashing on-screen. And that’s pretty gawl-dammed disappointing at the university level.
Here’s one of my fond memories of the phone company. Mary E. was this lecturer for the phone management. He course was that curious 1990’s oddity called “customer service”. This was supposed to rescue the failing western economies, the idea was to provide such excellent customer service that customer would ever dream of spending their money elsewhere. We know how that worked out, but in 1992, Mary had the entire phone company fooled. Mary claimed to be an expert on people getting along.
Now, in those days, very few people who worked for the company had ever lived in California. I had just got back from Los Angeles when the company sent me to Mary’s course. It was compulsory paid company time. She told the class how she had visited California and was totally impressed by how wonderful their customer service was, how superior it was to ours. We need, said Mary, only to change our thinking to remake the phone company into the most wonderful of places to work and you get the idea. She said she had gone to this jewelry store and they made her feel like a princess.
So I raised my hand and asked her which California she had been in. The one I was in you had to practically stand on the table to get a refill. I had been ignored at a jewelry store for only spending $800 on a ring for my wife, ignored by a purple-haired fat lady putting the squeeze on the twenty-five year old delivery boy. So I was wondering which California she meant because it sure wasn’t the one south of California. Mary and I never got along after that, but I figure that was her fault because she’s the self-proclaimed expert at cooperation, where I have never in my life said any such thing.
In those days, I published an anonymous newsletter that was a spoof on the company official line. It was very quick to point out that less than a year later, Mary’s husband dumped her, the irony being that she had said as part of her lectures that her techniques for getting others to do what she wanted had resulted in her perfect marriage. Around four months later, Mary left the company. My newsletter said that we were certain she went on to cooperate the hell out of some other place.
Sigh, how sad to see Emma all painted up like this for her grad picture. Sure, she’s no pin-up model, but she could have been a role model. (But I know, that’s not her job.) She could have let young women know that being pretty is enough, she doesn’t have to plaster on the mascara and lipstick. She could have started a wonderful trend among her peers, but nope, women always have to push the envelope and now she’s one step closer to the coke-hooker look. Give it another two years and she’ll have her hair kinked, mark my words. Look out Miley, this broad's still got a little class left.
So, you want to be a writer? I hear this often. A man with a life, but not just any life, his own interesting life, at least interesting to him. He will write his story, explain his defeats, get back at his enemies, clear up the reasons for his lack of success, why it will be the next great human interest classic. How to get started? My advice is sit down and type a million words. Do it in a reasonable time, say two years. If you can’t, stick with what you are doing. If you get writers block, if you repeat too often, quit. Read what you wrote. No vocabulary? No color? Nothing new to tell the reader? Then quit—not because I like telling people to quit, because I don’t. Quit because you are still ahead.
ADDENDUM
I downloaded a free 3D modeling application called Blender, which I will test soon. Careful, the download site is full of jargon that even today’s generation doesn’t understand. Please, 3D, we don’t need any space talk. Just tell the folks what the software does, and whether they want the installer or the zip package. I advise any newcomers to avoid the software that works online or any designs stored in the cloud. There is already software to detect if you try to print or design anything like handcuff keys or gun parts. And be very careful to uncheck all the boxes before you install this “freeware”. This installation places around 6,300 files on your computer.
The second industrial revolution, that is the tag name being applied to 3D printing. Still, I say we were right to wait this long, as we now know for certain very few people who operate these wonders make any money at it yet. I draw a large distinction between being first and being first to make money. Some of the concepts you may not have heard yet are:
The printing of a full 3D face based on 24 variants of 20 genes in a single DNA molecule found at a crime scene.
Comfortable 3D masks that alter your facial features as to be unrecognizable to Google Glass and other facial recognition software. They are worn like eyeglasses, are virtually weightless and comfortable.
Here is a fake cover that bad guys are fitting over the front piece of ATMs. The plate contains a skimmer, a device that reads the data on your credit card magnetic strip. For now, desktop 3D printers can’t handle pieces this complex or realistic, but the $20,000 commercial models can crank them out. The average credit card scam rakes in $400,000 so it isn’t going away soon or by itself.
