Wednesday: July 7, 2010
- State of the GLM: Yes, I'm still here. No, I'm not dead.
You may have noticed that GLM has gone rather quiet for the past two-three months or so in terms of any and all content on the site. This post serves as a status update to alleviate any fears that GeekLikeMe is gone for good. Quite the contrary my dear friends. And yes, while I could run down the list of excuses as to why the site hasn't been updated, I'm sure they would just bore you to tears. To save us all some time I shall sum up in two words: work and parenthood.
For work I have been diving into the grand world of Objective-C programming for the past six months and I still haven't managed to come up for air. Hopefully when I'm actually able to take a deep breath I'll have an array of iPhone and iPad apps to show for it. Also on this note I'd like to state that I very well may have taken the most ass-backwards route in getting into a new programming language. Nevertheless, it's been a rewarding and infuriating process thus far but I'm learning a lot and I think it'll turn out well in the end.
I don't think I have to say much about parenthood other than sleep is a sought-after commodity and there are only so many hours in a day. This has turned out to be a major contributing factor to the current lack of posting. Shocker.
But now onto much better news: a new version of GeekLikeMe.net is in the works yet again and I've decided to make a design choice right off the bat. I recently took a trip down memory lane courtesy of archive.org's wayback machine. After feeling somewhat nostalgic about the old GLM design I decided that maybe it was time to return to the minimalist roots yet again. More details and information about the new site coming soon!
P.S. You can also follow me on Twitter even though I have yet to tweet anything. Oops, scratch that.
Monday: May 17, 2010
- Google may have been accidentally snooping in on your wi-fi connections.
Let this be a lesson to you all to never leave a wi-fi network unsecured. The good news is that Google has agreed to stop collecting this data, at least for now.
Tuesday: May 11, 2010
- The top eleven signs that Facebook has violated your privacy.
If any of the aforementioned signs from this link have happened to you it might be a good time close out your Facebook account. If you're still unsure, check rule number one on the list before proceeding.
Tuesday: April 20, 2010
- Facebook now accounts for 41% of all social media traffic according to comScore stats.
As of March 2010, Facebook traffic made up 41% of all traffic on a list of popular social destinations. MySpace was in second place, capturing around 24% of traffic. Gmail had 15%, and Twitter had 8%.
Monday: April 12, 2010
- A gallery of the ten worst jobs in science according to Popular Science.
If anyone would know which jobs in science are the worst it would have to be Popular Science, right? If you choose to read on you'll learn about all kinds of disparaging work opportunities in the science field from the oceanic snot-diver all the way over to the feces piper. Lovely.
- Conan O'Brien headed over to TBS for brand new late-night talk show.
Said O'Brien: 'In three months I've gone from network television to Twitter to performing live in theaters, and now I'm headed to basic cable. My plan is working perfectly.' O'Brien will host his hour-long, yet-to-be-titled show Mondays through Thursdays at 11 p.m. (ET/PT).
- The Human Tetris Project just might be the next big social networking gaming craze.
Link points to a video over on ABC's website which goes over exactly what you'll be getting yourself into should you decide to take part in said project. It's an interesting concept and partnership between EA Games and Facebook. Definetly needs more Music A though.
Friday: April 9, 2010
- Multitasking and several other features coming to an iPhone near you.
That certainly was a whopper of an Apple presentation yesterday bringing tons of interesting features to iPhones, iPads, and iPods. I'm very curious to see how their iAds platform does once it is fully available. You can watch the entire presentation over on Apple's website.
Tuesday: March 30, 2010
- Thirteen small things to simplify your work day.
Some top Google executives just do 5-minute meetings — anyone who attends these meetings had better be prepared, and concise. If you can get out of meetings and just get the notes, or find an alternative way to communicate, it could save you hours per week.
Monday: March 22, 2010
- Brand new Apple patent may pave the way for their very own social network.
Yes, you may be getting your iSocial on in the near future thanks to this little patent that Apple has put forth specifically for the iPhone. Behind the scenes your iPhone passes tokens around to correspond with users in your immediate vicinity and let's you connect with them (either digitally or realistically).
Friday: March 19, 2010
- Netflix decides to do away with that friends feature that nobody used.
Maybe this would have worked better had they tried to incorporate into - I don't know, a popular social network perhaps? Seems like the right place where friends would want to exchange information about the types of movies they happen to be renting at the time. Maybe that's just me.
Wednesday: March 17, 2010
- Turns out that more and more employers are using tech to track workers.
This post details just how easy (and cheap) it is in this day and age to monitor exactly what people are doing in the workplace. If you happen to have some sort of job in a tech-related field - it's even easier. If you think Big Brother is watching you - well, he probably is.
Monday: March 15, 2010
- The folks at Digg would like you to know that a redesign is coming in the near future.
Wow, I haven't used Digg in a long, long time (reddit ftw) but I'm quite curious to see what new 'radical features' they have in store. One of the key changes according to the source article is an unlimited number of topics (aka subreddits). How original.
Tuesday: March 9, 2010
- Location services might be coming to your Facebook account in near future.
Soon you'll know exactly where all of your friends are and where you can find them. Isn't it great when mystical items from movies and books somehow make their way into real life? It's almost like magic.
- Cisco's big Internet-changing announcement? Brand new speedy routers.
That's right folks, this new and improved router can handle up to twelve times the speed of your now traditional non-speedy routers. Change has come to your Interwebs, be sure to hold your excitement.
Thursday: March 4, 2010
- Escaped monkey manages to make time for several Facebook appearances.
Facebook: the only place where you can find photos of an escaped monkey and then read posts by that same monkey as he taunts the authorities. Is there anything social networking can't do?
- Daily Grind: Crazed
Name: Vin (aka robot on the rampage)
Occupation: Webmaster / Procrastinator / Dad
How Vin feels today: Crazed @ 2:57:12 PM
What Vin really wants today: To note disappointment in lame attempt to get back on track with consistent daily grind posts. No sleep and no sleep makes Vincent something something.Music Stuck in Head: Cheap Utah Blues / God Street Wine
This absolutely made my day yesterday. I discovered a page on archive.org that had rare and unreleased tracks from one my favorite (and for the most part generally unknown) bands. Here is a link to said tracks for those who care.Stuff to do today:
- Research more methods on how to obtain sleep whilst parenting a child that does not like to sleep
- Commit to aggresive napping during strategic parts of the day
- Strategy is dumb and may lead to eventual work dismissal
- Continue researching new methods of data capture via strategically placed web tracking bus
- Translation: reverse engineer Google Analytics code snippet for fun
- More sleep is required to pull this one off
Tuesday: March 2, 2010
- Y2K-like bug responsible for recent PlayStation Network outage.
The company urged customers not to use the older PlayStation 3 systems until the problem is resolved, warning that doing so could cause errors and make it impossible to record gaming achievements and restore some data.
Monday: March 1, 2010
- Eleven tips for making for your home (or work) office more comfortable.
This article seems to be geared to freelancers probably because the source website is all about freelancing. Well, I say nay to that my friends. This article can cross freelancer/worker lines and apply to anyone who happens to have an office at their job as well. I need more plants.
- Facebook's recently awarded news-feed patent could spell trouble for other social sites.
Twitter is effectively one giant news feed, to the extent that it clearly has influenced some of the changes that Facebook made to its own feed technology. That reaction could be alarmist. And yet prominent figures elsewhere in the social-media world don't seem thrilled.
Thursday: February 18, 2010
- New website exposes the dangers of improper social network usage.
In a nutshell, a third party service posts your location status via Twitter. Someone managed to aggregate that content into one easy website for the entire world to see. A happy day for burglars round the world.
Wednesday: February 17, 2010
- Microsoft to bring MySpace and Facebook into Outlook.
I foresee this particular move as something that will greatly increase the productivity of every corporate employee that happens to use Microsoft Outlook as their primary email program.
Tuesday: February 16, 2010
- Google decides to modify Buzz platform after some specific privacy issues come to light.
And before Google made the latest changes, who's in those circles could easily be exposed to others without the user even realizing it. Suddenly your boss could discover that you've been corresponding with a rival company that happens to have some job openings.
Friday: February 12, 2010
- Twelve undocumented tricks you can use in Google Buzz.
Have you gotten enough Google Buzz lately? If you're still on the fence or just want to tinker with it some more some more with it, some of this tricks are an interesting waste of time (as is my genaral feeling with social networking). And yes, one of the tricks includes turning it off.
Wednesday: February 10, 2010
- Google takes a big step into the social networking arena with new service.
Google Buzz is a new way to start conversations about the things you find interesting. It's built right into Gmail, so you don't have to peck out an entirely new set of friends from scratch — it just works. If you think about it, there's always been a big social network underlying Gmail.
Monday: February 1, 2010
- AT&T decides that pouring another two billion dollars into their mobile network is worth it.
AT&T plans to spend between $18 billion and $19 billion in 2010 upgrading its wireless and backhaul networks to handle the onslaught of new traffic. This is roughly $2 billion more than the company had invested in the previous year.
Tuesday: January 26, 2010
- Weird Al to direct his first feature film for Cartoon Network.
Not many details yet but congrats to Al on this new gig. Fun fact: two members of my immediate family can still recite the lyrics from 'Dare to be Stupid' from memory. Bonus fact: we are both over the age of thirty.
Monday: January 11, 2010
- Daily Grind: Twitchy
Name: Vin (aka shakey mctwitchy)
Occupation: Webmaster / Procrastinator / Dad
How Vin feels today: Twitchy @ 1:38:25 PM
What Vin really wants today: More sleep. Also, more coffee but without the twitchy side effects. Attempt to lessen coffee intake as day progresses.Music Stuck in Head: Night Moves / Bog Seager
Disturbing yet fitting all at the same time.Stuff to do today:
- Launch a whole bunch of updates for work related tasks/projects/favors/requests
- Fix several stupid mistakes made due to lack of sleep
- Pat self on back for being smart enough to make backups first
- Yawn
- Prep house for ensuing pipework with chances of dirt/dust clouds that will begin shortly
- ...all of which should be just great for the sinuses
- Buy masks for family
Friday: January 8, 2010
- Palm pulls the curtain back on phones that can create personal wifi hotspots.
Palm says the application will give customers the option of creating a personal Wi-Fi cloud capable of sharing Verizon's 3G network with up to five Wi-Fi-enabled devices.
Thursday: January 7, 2010
- New survey shows IT job satisfaction now at an all-time low.
Free food always helps to bolster my overall mood and in some cases overall job satisfaction. Let this be a reminder to any of you who happen to have an IT staff on call, bring them food and help shall come.
