Tales from the Technoverse

Commentary on social networking, technology, movies, society, and random musings

Tales from the Technoverse header image 1

Iran’s President Wished All Jews a Happy Rosh Hashanah on Twitter (from the Washington Post)

September 4th, 2013 · international, judaism

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani’s English-language Twitter account sent out this message just before sunset, Tehran time, wishing Jews a happy Rosh Hashanah, which is the Jewish new year and begins at sundown:

As the sun is about to set here in I wish all Jews, especially Iranian Jews, a blessed Rosh Hashanah. pic.twitter.com/tmaf84x7UR

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2013/09/04/irans-president-just-wished-all-jews-a-happy-rosh-hashanah-on-twitter/

 

While the message itself is remarkable (maybe), the fact that the President of a country, and evidently other leaders in Iran, post messages to Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and so on, is amazing. Who could possibly have predicted such things?

I make no comment about whether the sentiments were sincere or not, the fact that such communications exist, and the fact that the leaders in many countries feel a need to participate is a dramatic change.

Comments Off on Iran’s President Wished All Jews a Happy Rosh Hashanah on Twitter (from the Washington Post)Tags: ···

Mobile Technology Is Impacting the Impact of War

September 3rd, 2013 · mobility

From the Financial Times:

As violence linked to the crisis in neighbouring Syria increasingly slips over the border, the Lebanese have come up with a novel way of coping: advance-warning apps.

Smartphone applications that map gun battles and differentiate between fireworks and gunfire, offer paths around roadblocks and even contact the army in the event of kidnap are becoming a must-have for Lebanese commuters.

“In other places in the world, the only thing that might obstruct your path is traffic,” said Mohammad Taha, an entrepreneur behind one of the products. “In Lebanon there are many things that can happen.”

 

http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/7fa6c9e8-13de-11e3-9289-00144feabdc0.html#axzz2drnFuPaI

 

Comments Off on Mobile Technology Is Impacting the Impact of WarTags: ···

Updates From The War of the Nationals

August 29th, 2013 · baseball

I coordinate a season ticket group for Nationals games.

Each year we have a draft where the games are allocated, Ellen and I get 27 home games (of the 81) plus we pick up perhaps 5 or 6 additional games for one reason or another.

Because of other conflicts and our general rule of not going Friday evenings, there are some weeks where we go almost every game. This week is one of them. We have (or had) tickets for Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday.  This happened once before earlier this year. The difference is that the first time this happened they lost almost every game we saw. This time, thus far, they are winning.

Last night we came up against the dreaded Metro baseball curfew. The last metro train from Sunday – Thursday leaves the Navy Yard (where the stadium is located) at 11:20pm. When there is a rain delay (like there was), or music after the game (like there will be tonight), or that rare occasion when the Nationals are playing Sunday and become the game of the week moving the start time to 8:05pm rather than afternoon which is normal for Sundays then either we need to drive or we need to leave before the game (or music) is complete.

Last night we left after the Nationals went ahead in the bottom of the 7th 4-3, what turned out to be the final score. We are undecided about whether we will drive or metro tonight, but will definitely drive Sunday. Too bad there isn’t one last Metro run closer to 1am on weekdays that would be very helpful (for us anyway).

In the playoff status, the Nationals have:

* ten more losses than St. Louis & Pittsburgh

* six more than Cincinnati

* one more than Arizona

They need to pass two of those teams, getting closer.

Comments Off on Updates From The War of the NationalsTags:

As Usual A Sports Team I Root For Is Toying With Me – Go Nationals

August 27th, 2013 · baseball

So after last year’s magical baseball carpet ride with the Nationals which ended when Drew Storen pulled on that thread hanging out of the carpet and unraveled the whole thing, THIS YEAR has been a tough go of it.

Terrible fielding, slumps by almost everyone not injured and not named Werth, and the off-season free agent signings not living up to expectations have kept the Nationals at or below .500. I must admit I liked it better when they had the best record in baseball, but as I said last year was pretty magical.

And yet, and yet – even though they only have a really small (imagine two fingers held very close together) chance of making the playoffs, the chance is still above zero (imagine two fingers held very close but still separate).

[Read more →]

Comments Off on As Usual A Sports Team I Root For Is Toying With Me – Go NationalsTags: ·

Big Telephony Changes at Home

August 26th, 2013 · mobility, technology

We have a blended family. My daughters and wife have Macs and I have a PC.

In fact, if you recall the Mac/PC ads, compiled here, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZSBWbnmGrE, you will recall how cool the Mac guy was and how uncool the PC guy was, that basically describes us.

[Read more →]

Comments Off on Big Telephony Changes at HomeTags: ······

Maryland Renaissance Festival – Still Great

August 25th, 2013 · Entertainment

So yesterday, Saturday, Ellen went to NYC to provide moral (and physical) support to Miriam to help with her apartment move from someplace in Brooklyn to some other place in Brooklyn (you can tell how well I know Brooklyn).  BTW, among other things Ellen spent five hours (FIVE HOURS!!) with Miriam and Miro (Miriam’s roommate) at IKEA. I am not sure what would happen if I was in IKEA (any IKEA) for five hours, but the one thing I could not do is stay there.

Regardless, I was then faced with a dilemma. I could have gone to Synagogue (probably the right thing to do). At Synagogue there were two family events. The way it works at our Synagogue is that often families having family events ‘enhance’ the kiddush meal (making it nicer, adding options). I suspect the kiddush meal was probably pretty nice. ALSO, downtown there was the option to go to Penn Quarter, spend $13 and participate in the all-you-can-eat ice-cream sandwich activity. Evidently ice-cream sandwiches have joined yogurt, donuts, macoroni and cheese, and so on as sort-of gourmet foods (who knew).

However, yesterday was also the opening day of the Maryland Rennissance Festival, http://www.rennfest.com/. And I had a family obligation, since Miriam was coming home for Yom Kippur, Saturday, September 14 (near her birthday), and we all would be going Sunday; there was an opportunity to scout ahead to make the September visit more smooth (I admit that was a pretty weak rationale, but it was the best I had yesterday morning). Also the weather was nice.

The Festival for all who want to know is once again a great event.

[Read more →]

→ 1 CommentTags:

How Do You Handle a Brawny…, I mean Brony…, Um

August 23rd, 2013 · popular culture

I recently read an article about the annual BronyCon, www.bronycon.org, held a few weeks ago in Baltimore MD. After finally realizing that this was a real event, I naturally turned to the Internet to find out more.

The BronyCon is a convention focused on the cartoon My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. Attendees are almost all male and call themselves bronies.

The August BronyCon had over 8,000 attendees, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BronyCon.

In a Baltimore Sun article, http://articles.baltimoresun.com/2013-08-02/entertainment/bs-ae-brony-culture-20130730_1_little-pony-bronycon-2013-tv-show, quotes one attendee:

“Many bronies say their obsession centers on the show’s cast of well-rounded, relatable characters. Weiss said he’s most like Fluttershy, as they are “both kind of socially awkward but we both like to muster the courage to speak out when we need to.” And Max Stahman, a first-year graduate student at the University of Maryland, is drawn to Rarity, a pony who is “somewhat snobbish and can rub people the wrong way, but ultimately has the best intentions and is a nice person.””

and

“”It’s one thing if it’s ironic,” Miller said. “But when you’re wearing a shirt with [the character] Pinkie Pie on it because you genuinely like Pinkie Pie, that’s different.””

Hopefully after telling my wife about all this, she will stop making fun of me going to see Serenity every year. If not, there is always Pinkie Pie shirts.

Comments Off on How Do You Handle a Brawny…, I mean Brony…, UmTags:

Department of the Interior and the Cloud

August 22nd, 2013 · cloud computing

An interesting article in InformationWeek Government about DOI’s plans for cloud computing:

The Department of the Interior’s (DOI’s) decision to invest as much as $10 billion to migrate its IT operations to the cloud, through a set of 10 competing contracts, is perhaps the most significant example yet of how central cloud computing is becoming to federal agencies — and to leading federal IT service providers. Experts also believe it will set the agency on a path toward becoming a major government cloud service provider.

http://www.informationweek.com/government/cloud-saas/government-clouds-interior-dept-sets-new/240160258?cid=NL_IWK_Gov_240160258&elq=6847d7affb1b4161b9398be61fdfb3dc

Comments Off on Department of the Interior and the CloudTags:

Movie Review: Ballad of a Soldier

August 21st, 2013 · movies

I finished watching Ballad of a Soldier earlier this week, http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/ballad_of_a_soldier/.

Ballad of a Soldier per Rotten Tomatoes, was “the first Russian film to score an American success during the Cold War era”. It was released in 1959. The movie has a relatively rare 100% rating in Rotten Tomatoes, one of the reasons why I added it to my elliptical-walker-exercise-queue.

The story tells of a young Russian soldier during World War II who is given leave to visit his mother at home as a result of him knocking out a couple of tanks during a battle. While traveling home random events occur which lead him to do a number of good deeds for people and end up limiting the time he actually was able to spend at home. We are told at the very beginning of the film that he died during the war, which strengthens our feelings toward these events.

[Read more →]

Comments Off on Movie Review: Ballad of a SoldierTags:

Federal News Countdown Stories – Mobile Apps, Continuous Monitoring, Confusion Around Intell Review Leadership

August 19th, 2013 · cyber-security, mobility, technology

Last Friday, I was on the Federal News Countdown on WFED, hosted by Francis Rose, along with Steven Bucci, Director of the Douglas & Sarah Allison Center and Senior Fellow for Defense & Homeland Security at The Heritage Foundation.

Here is the link to the broadcast: http://www.federalnewsradio.com/156/3425850/Federal-News-Countdown-New-DHS-contract-standardizes-cyber-protections-DoD-cuts-force-lower-sights-on-drones.

The way the News Countdown works is that each of the guests talks about their third most important story of that week relating to the Federal Government, then the second and finally the most important.

The following are the three articles I selected plus some additional comments.

[Read more →]

→ 2 CommentsTags: ··