Overheard on “slashdot”:http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/06/01/2255208 today:
_If you could go back in time to 1980 and tell everyone that in 25 years, European governments would be spearheading an initiative called “Operation Spam Zombies”:http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/conline/edcams/spam/zombie/, and that this name was not in any way meant to be humorous, the looks on peoples faces would be priceless._
Now *that’s* what I’m talkin’ about. None of this mumbling about the end of the world or strange portents. “Prophet Yahweh”:http://www.prophetyahweh.com/ has a simple, straightforward prophecy: “Spaceships Will Appear Over Las Vegas On My Signal”:http://www.prweb.com/releases/2005/5/prweb243327.php.
His press release has all the details, including, “The spaceship will hover in the sky … for almost two days. All Las Vegans will be able to see it, day and night…” Even “James Randi”:http://www.randi.org/ would approve of such a bold, falsifiable statement.
I recently accepted a position at “EVDB”:http://www.evdb.com/, a start-up which is building an events database. It’s a deceptively simple concept with far-reaching applications and more than its share of challenges; that translates to “lots of interesting work to do” and makes it a good fit for me.
Now, if I could just decide on a “calendar”:http://www.evdb.com/search_handler?keywords=global+spin to include in the sidebar here as a test. Any ideas?
I’ve been trying desperately to determine why this technique for “reconstructing a scene from a different vantage point”:http://graphics.stanford.edu/papers/dual_photography/ is useful (as opposed to just a neat trick). It’s probably a great technique for use with live-action-plus-CG films, but I’m at a loss to find any other application.
Still, it reminds me of a discussion I had with Adam Houston a while back about using a regular wall as a mirror by reconstructing the paths of all the light rays hitting it. They aren’t quite doing that, but they can still see the back face of a playing card using a similar trick. (View the video at the bottom to see the trick in action.)
Can’t figure out how to solve real problems? Take a tip from the Governator: “make up your own problem and solve it”:http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2005/05/27/GOVERNOR.TMP as a little pick-me-up.
Sigh.