Mark Turner

UNC-TV back at full power!

I wrote UNC-TV today to ask when their antenna upgrades would be completed. It turns out the job was done just this past Friday evening!

Here’s the word from Gary Coble, Transmitter Site Supervisor at UNC-TV:

At 7:19pm on Friday August 21 WUNC-TV Channel 4 began full power maximized operation. The operation is at 1 Million Watts on the top mounted main antenna. For those viewers using outside antennas please aim your antenna towards the transmitter site in Northern Chatham County, just Southwest of downtown Chapel Hill and rescan your converter box or digital TV tuner. Thank you for your patience and thank you for watching UNC-TV!

After rescanning my channels, I can report the signal is coming in better than ever. I’m glad to have my PBS back!

Facebook is the new AOL

Remember in the early, dot-com days of the Internet there were two classes of Internet users, dialup users and AOL users? The dialup users had access to the full Internet (well, full for the time, anyway) and AOL users got a sanitized, prepackaged version of the Internet at best. We dialup users looked down on the AOL users and their “walled-garden” system.

It dawned on me today that Facebook is the new AOL. Facebook has this whole environment where things are controlled and it’s set apart from the rest of the Internet. There are some people whose online experience consists almost completely of Facebook. It’s a walled-garden just like AOL.

I’ve been on the Internet since 1992, the same year that AOL for Windows debuted. Seventeen years later we are back where we started.

(You clever MT.Net readers are different, though. The fact that you’re reading this shows you’re not part of the unwashed masses. Pat yourselves on the back.)

Free the tubes

Andy Kessler wrote an insightful piece on the stifling state of communications in America, called Why AT&T Killed Google Voice.

Apple has an exclusive deal with AT&T in the U.S., stirring up rumors that AT&T was the one behind Apple rejecting Google Voice. How could AT&T not object? AT&T clings to the old business of charging for voice calls in minutes. It takes not much more than 10 kilobits per second of data to handle voice. In a world of megabit per-second connections, that’s nothing—hence Google’s proposal to offer voice calls for no cost and heap on features galore.

What this episode really uncovers is that AT&T is dying. AT&T is dragging down the rest of us by overcharging us for voice calls and stifling innovation in a mobile data market critical to the U.S. economy.

Kessler mentions that people will one day buy their TV by the show and not the network, which is the same thing I’ve been saying. Packets are packets, and we don’t need monopoly-owned pipes anymore, whether they be real like AT&T or virtual like Apple’s iTunes. It’s time to crank the data networks wide open!

Zombies pose a threat

Canadian scientists conclude that zombies could concievably destroy civilization. That is, if they actually existed:

If zombies actually existed, an attack by them would lead to the collapse of civilisation unless dealt with quickly and aggressively.

That is the conclusion of a mathematical exercise carried out by researchers in Canada.

They say only frequent counter-attacks with increasing force would eradicate the fictional creatures.

The scientific paper is published in a book – Infectious Diseases Modelling Research Progress.

Hrmf. If they actually existed. They don’t … right?

Fzzt!

Three days ago yet another of our Bright Effects CFL bulbs dropped dead. This time I saw its spectacular death, as light flickered brilliantly through the dying bulb. Then there was an alarming smell that I soon recognized: the smell of a fried capacitor.
180px-Energiesparlampe_01_retouched
Capacitors have long been a problem in my electronics. I bought a video camera back in the 1980s with capacitors inside that were allegedly counterfeit. Just a few years into its life the camera’s electronics literally melted off the circuit board, rendering it useless. Most of my other CFLs died due to bad ballast electronics, too. I haven’t pried my dead bulbs open yet to check but it wouldn’t surprise me of all of them didn’t meet their maker due to bad capacitors (at least the one in February did).

One day, I hope a bulb manufacturer will create a replaceable ballast module like I’ve suggested.

We’re Not Getting Any Younger

Another gem Pandora brought me. What a great pop song.

We’re Not Getting Any Younger (free mp3 from ReverbNation)
Color Theory

I say I should take you home but you want to stay here
On the beach all alone with our blankets and beer
In the dark how we ache to fulfill this hunger
Cherish it now cause we’re not getting any younger

Ashes in fire pits and fires in our hearts as we move
Crashing waves in an urgent and quickening groove
Consummating the end of a perfect summer
Cherish it now cause we’re not getting any younger
Continue reading →

Bill-ding suspense

Tropical_Storm_Bill-20090816This upcoming weekend could be an interesting if tropical storm Bill tracks the way it is now. Of course, there’s lots of ocean to cross and plenty of time between now and then but keep an eye out (no pun intended).

I was just wondering when our tropical storm season might heat up and it looks like that time is now.

Update Aug 17 9:30 PM: Looks like Hurricane Bill will veer away from the mainland.

Chevrolet Hills now ready for paving

We drove up to our friends the Naylor’s Lake Gaston lakehouse this morning. It had been a while since I drove up that part of Capital Boulevard and I was dismayed to see the old Cheviot Hills Golf Course now completely cleared, with few, if any, remaining trees. I’ve known it was coming, as it was bought by car dealers and car dealers do what car dealers do: they build car lots. But do they have to plow over every damn tree to build their lots?

I don’t know why it bothers me so, as I never set foot on that golf course, and the jackass who ran it pissed me off with his late night, drunken hunting. I suppose it’s trading a unique community resource for yet another faceless car dealership.
Continue reading →

Cable TV

Cable TV (YouTube)
Fol Chen

Now you’ve been working so hard
Running in circles
Like a robot shorting circuits
Like it’s set to blow

I’ve gotta make an appointment
Just to kiss you
Baby I’m not complaining
But I’ve got to know
Continue reading →

Clint Eastwood

Clint Eastwood (Youtube)
Gorillaz

Ain’t happy, I’m feeling glad
I got sunshine in a bag
I’m useless but not for long
The future is coming on

Ain’t happy, I’m feeling glad
I got sunshine in a bag
I’m useless but not for long
The future is coming on

Continue reading →