Electric DeLorean: First Drive

The DeLorean’s long been associated with technology and performance, despite being saddled with a French-Swedish powerplant that made those associations slightly laughable. This weekend I drove the Electric DeLorean. I’m not laughing anymore.

I don’t think it requires 1.21 gigawatts.

Action shots / photo gallery towards the bottom of that link.

#autonews

The Walken Dead

For every zombie who’s ever wanted their brains served with a side of cowbell.

Can’t wait to watch the real deal tonight.

Elsewhere:

• Big boys on ‘The Walking Dead’ don’t cry (spoilers)

#funnies #videos #thewalkingdead

Wall Street Protests Span Four Continents, Arrests Climb

The Occupy Wall Street demonstrations began last month, with about 6,000 people gathering in Times Square for what organizers called a “global day of action against Wall Street greed” on Oct. 15. The protests then spread to Europe and Asia, with more than 100 people injured in Rome after as many as 200,000 people gathered on the same day, the Corriere della Sera newspaper reported.

This is getting good.

Elsewhere:

• Occupy Wall Street assault: lawyer demands action on policeman’s punch
• Occupy Wall Street Spreads Worldwide
• Understanding the Occupy Wall Street movement: A primer

#politics

Chevrolet Speedometer Design

2011 marks the 100th anniversary of Chevrolet. During these 100 years Chevrolet developed over a hundred different types of cars, vans and trucks. All of those cars, vans and trucks have something in common: they all contain speedometers.

Way cool. Personally I don’t think numeric digital gauges will ever be popular.

#autonews

Best #StarWars clip I’ve seen in a long time.

#videos #funnies

Note the headline:

Apple Using ICloud to Lock in Users After Online Misfires

Note the part that mentions lock in:

If Apple makes it difficult for consumers to move files to rival online services, iCloud also could infringe users’ rights to their own information, said Jonathan Zittrain, co-founder of the Berkman Center for Internet & Society.

I’m not saying that Apple won’t make it harder to leave their services once you’re hooked. What I am saying is that the headline implies one thing while the article never lives up to that implication. Pure link bait.

On a different note, syncing music is an iOS headache, amplified by the current state of iTunes – that part I can see. But I would never have iWork auto-magically sync my documents across devices and iCloud. Documents are things I’ve slaved over and can never be replaced if “lost” or “tampered” with. I can always download MP3s again, from another site if needed.

I’m also paranoid. I don’t/won’t store anything “important” in someone else’s cloud.

So it’s obvious Apple isn’t targeting me. They’re after the doctors making Numbers’ spreadsheets on iPads in the hospital. iCloud syncing all that business data would be a godsend for users and a bankroll for Apple.

#apple

The Lone Ranger and Thor 2 release dates pushed back

With The Lone Ranger budget trimmed Disney, producer Jerry Bruckheimer, and director Gore Verbinski are now aiming to begin filming in February. The delay in production has rendered the December 2012 release date impossible, so Disney has pushed The Lone Ranger back to summer 2013, and to make room they’ve pushed the Thor sequel back to later in the year.

I hadn’t even heard of this movie. It’ll be interesting to see Johnny Depp as Tonto though, he hasn’t been in a good western since Dead Man.

#movies

Breaking Bad remains great, but we miss geeky chemistry of early seasons

In one scene, White creates a galvanic cell to jump start their stranded camper after a bad day out in the lab. Walter White proves time and again how powerful science can be, acting as a sort of meth-cooking MacGyver. […]

Still, the point is how the show treats hard science as a way to solve problems. Walter White is something of a superhero due to his education in practical chemistry, and that’s a rare thing in television.

Couldn’t agree more. Sure T.V. Shows need to evolve but everybody’s favorite line from Jessie has to be “Yay, science!”

If you need to quickly get up to speed on the show, have a look at the Breaking Bad Wiki.

#tv #breakingbad

Dennis Ritchie has also passed on… I could also write some blurb but have a peek at the Google News stories, they’ll give you the details.

C is quirky, flawed, and an enormous success. x}-;-‘—-

#rip

Stevey’s Google Platforms Rant

I was at Amazon for about six and a half years, and now I’ve been at Google for that long. One thing that struck me immediately about the two companies — an impression that has been reinforced almost daily — is that Amazon does everything wrong, and Google does everything right. Sure, it’s a sweeping generalization, but a surprisingly accurate one. It’s pretty crazy. There are probably a hundred or even two hundred different ways you can compare the two companies, and Google is superior in all but three of them, if I recall correctly. I actually did a spreadsheet at one point but Legal wouldn’t let me show it to anyone, even though recruiting loved it.

…

Google+ is a prime example of our complete failure to understand platforms from the very highest levels of executive leadership (hi Larry, Sergey, Eric, Vic, howdy howdy) down to the very lowest leaf workers (hey yo). We all don’t get it.

It’s lengthy but a great insight into working at both Amazon and Google. If you’re a developer, pay attention to the “extending the platform” concepts. Any kind of framework needs plug-ins to win. Just ask WordPress and Firefox.

PS. I stuffed a copy in Evernote for safe-keepings.

#google