popfly

Today at the Maker Faire, I got to see a demo of a freaking amazing new technology called Popfly.

It's basically a GUI mashup maker, but it's oh so much more interesting than it sounds.

The best way to understand it is to watch this video.

It's a graphical way to interface with an API. You publish an object, and the data that it outputs, and then plug it into other objects that consume that data. Then you preview what you just created, with one click. Then you drop it on a website. Or make it an OS widget. Done.

Imagine how people program in all those sci-fi movies we all make fun of. "Yeah right, he just spun around some cubes and hacked the mainframe". This is pretty fucking close.

I've applied for the alpha, which is closed. If I get in, I'll post some of my creations here. I can't believe how cool it looks.

son of a bitch took the one true ring

We got a little clever this week with Noobtoob, and I think I did a pretty good job of editing it all together. And don't worry if you find gaming podcasts boring, the magic trick we did was in the first 30 seconds, you can stop after that. :)



Also, if you haven't seen this Transformers trailer yet, you need to watch it right now. (The top, "exclusive" one.) It made me cry like a little girl, all five times that I watched it. The shoulder swipe THROUGH the moving bus is an especially magnificent moment. All the transformers just look so fucking cool. July 4th can't come soon enough.

incrementally more legitimate

Sweet, noobtoob got mentioned in this week's "podcast roundup" over at joystiq.

"In this episode of the video/audio cast, we all realize that the game drought has gone too far when hosts Tobin Coziahr and Yuzo Watanabe have to host a show about Eets: Chowdown and SNK vs. Capcom Card Fighters DS. That's quite a bullet to take for us, guys. Did you ever know that you're my heroes?"

Sure, the comment was mostly about how we're scraping the bottom of the barrel during the gaming doldrums of May, but hey, I'll take it. :)

focus

I know this is a small thing, but:

1) If I'm loading a page, and I start typing in a text field, finishing the page load shouldn't make my text box lose focus. That's really stupid. Once the text box exists, once I click in it, it should keep the cursor and let me type in it.

2) Applications shouldn't be able to grab focus just because they've started, ESPECIALLY if I've told them to go away already. There's several programs that I'll start, and they'll grab foreground, and I'll then click back to the application that I'm currently using. Those programs, once they've fully started, will AGAIN grab focus. No, no, no, no. I will click on you when I am ready. Stop fucking crowding into focus. I don't like feeling like I'm wrestling with my UI.

east coast arguments

You know, sometimes I really miss arguing with east coast people.

Tonight I was out with some people, and when the conversation stayed around the stereotypical stuff of people our age, cultural references and cynicism and easy jokes, the conversation flowed freely and everything was fun.

But the second things turned at all political and interesting, I remembered what drives me nuts about California liberalism. They're just not used to being around people that disagree with them, and it makes them so uncomfortable that they're unable to have an intelligent conversation.

It's one of those bizarre condescending things that drives me absolutely crazy. As soon as they realize you're not hook line and sinker part of the bay area liberal mentality, even though my libertarianism makes me about half liberal, they start making dismissive statements like "Oh, Tobin is just wrong. Ha ha ha.", and completely refusing to engage in any viewpoint that isn't their own.

In Pittsburgh and Maryland, I had some amazing and enlightening conversations where I actually learned about how other people thought, and *gasp* changed some of my opinions when people had well thought out arguments. Out here in California, I tend to make a few logical arguments that people don't (or can't) refute, and they retreat into jokes and insults, and never engage at all. They're so horrified that someone wouldn't be trying to out-liberal them like all their other friends that they basically go into an intellectual paralysis, despite being otherwise intelligent people.

It's not that these people don't have political opinions, they're full of them, and they want to spout them at every possible opportunity. They just don't want to *discuss* them. Any actual discussion makes them very uncomfortable, they just want to say what they believe, and have everyone around them nod sympathetically.

This is a pretty common pattern. I've had very few intelligent political conversations with people that disagree with me since I came out to California, and I find myself missing the challenge and excitement of it. What's the fun in only talking to people that agree with you, you bastards? These are things that are IMPORTANT. We should talk about them. Lots of people who don't live in this little bubble disagree with you, and you should be willing to engage and understand them.

worst plot ever

The plot for "Next", which is apparently in theaters now, is one of the stupidest things I've ever read. It sounds like a joke:

"Las Vegas showroom magician Cris Johnson has a secret which is a gift and a curse which torments him: he can see a few minutes into the future. But when a terrorist group threatens to detonate a nuclear device in Los Angeles, government agent Callie Ferris must use all her wiles to capture Cris and convince him to help her stop the cataclysm."

Jesus, really? Run out of ideas, did you?

Cris travels back to the land of Hanah Lee, and gets his faithful buddy Puff the Magic Dragon. Together they fight all sorts of awful brown people! Then, they go into space with Chuck Norris and rescue some astronauts who are stuck in a failing space station!

Actually, I'd watch that one.