Mostly, I Write

Cinque anni fa arrivava l’ultimo Mac Pro. A quando il prossimo? - Il mio articolo per Macity https://www.macitynet.it/cinque-anni-fa-arrivava-lultimo-mac-pro-a-quando-il-prossimo/

JustWrite, quando la carta diventa digitale - Il mio articolo per La Stampa (a pagamento) https://www.lastampa.it/2018/12/21/tecnologia/justwrite-quando-la-carta-diventa-digitale-BBFLE3vOe9uIaMwDPATz1L/premium.html

TLDR: siamo in guerra e non lo sapevamo. Non sembra che finirà bene. Money quote: "The Information World War has already been going on for several years. We called the opening skirmishes “media manipulation” and “hoaxes”, assuming that we were dealing with ideological pranksters doing it for the lulz (and that lulz were harmless). In reality, the combatants are professional, state-employed cyberwarriors and seasoned amateur guerrillas pursuing very well-defined objectives with military precision and specialized tools. Each type of combatant brings a different mental model to the conflict, but uses the same set of tools." https://www.ribbonfarm.com/2018/11/28/the-digital-maginot-line/

"Aquaman", grandi effetti speciali per una storia non irresistibile - la mia recensione per Fumettologica http://www.fumettologica.it/2018/12/aquaman-recensione-film/

Cose che, secondo alcuni amici americani, stanno scomparendo Money quotes: Music CD’s - it was announced recently that a couple of big box stores are dropping them from their shelves. The word “TWICE”. No, really! Just start listening out for it and you’ll notice that almost every TV advert that should be using the word will say “TWO TIMES” instead…and it’s spreading, I hear this ugly replacement for a perfectly good word in news stories too. Why? It’s a total mystery! (Of course “THRICE” already went the way of the Dodo…so…) Stick-shift cars. Most new cars no longer come with the option to drive stick. The grammatical rule that disallows “split infinitives” (Like “To boldly go where no man has gone before!”…which should strictly be “To go boldly…”) In the USA - extending tape measures with inches on one edge of the tape and centimeters on the other. I broke mine a few months ago and neither of the local DIY stores have anything other than “Easy Read” tape measures with only inches. I had to hunt around online to find one that I could still order. Cash. Already, several countries are considering completely abolishing cash…and a while back, I needed cash for something (I forget what) - and realized that I’ve had no cash in my wallet for more than two years! Philips screw heads. (The ones like a plus sign) The replacement is the six-sided “torx” head screws (like a star sign) - and in some cases the Allen head - which is a regular hexagon. With the improvement in design of electric screwdrivers, the old philips screws (which are DESIGNED to strip under high torque to protect the tool from damage) are overdue for replacement.

Per noi, almeno per adesso, è marginale. Però questo ritratto di Ted Cruz è fichissimo. Money quote: “His pitch for votes was still an off-the-rack Tea Party platform, complete with warnings about the menace of creeping progressivism, delivered at a slightly mechanical pace but with lots of punch. The woman next to me remarked, “This is the fire in the gut! Like he had the first time!” referring to Cruz’s successful long-shot run in the 2011 Texas Republican Senate primary. And it’s true—the speech was exactly like one Cruz would have delivered in 2011, right down to one specific detail: he never mentioned Donald Trump by name.” https://harpers.org/archive/2018/11/the-tragedy-of-ted-cruz/

Siamo alla fine dell'anno: tempo di investimenti. Se volete l'American Express, usate il mio link e ne trarremo entrambi benefici. La uso da una vita e ha molti vantaggi utili: la gold vale come assicurazione medica per i viaggi all'estero. Per me solo questo è un bel risparmio. www.americanexpress.it/amico/antondEgGx?CPID=100332058

Se volete la carbonara... The first time I ordered carbonara in America, I had to politely refuse to eat it and ordered something else. When the waitress asked why, I explained that Italian carbonara does not have cream in it. I was less than politely told that if I wanted “Italian carbonara”, I should have stayed in Italy.

Gli scrittori sono una razza strana. Pare non ce ne sia uno con tutte le rotelle a posto. Questo è un bell'articolo sulla depressione, ad esempio. Però, mamma mia quanto è sfasciato 'sto tizio. Money quote: "If you want to be super popular on social media just tell people a bunch of bullshit that sounds great but really does absolutely nothing to make you healthy and happy. It’s also the key to getting on every best seller list and getting quoted on Oprah and tweeted by mega-celebrities who sell products they don’t use because they’re pretty to look at and have a few million followers on Instagram. It’s all a lie." https://medium.com/the-mission/mastering-depression-and-living-the-life-you-were-meant-to-live-a9b4e357ddd9

È quasi Natale: siete pronti per le feste?

Il giorno in cui l’Internet Archive smise di salvare il web - il mio articolo per La Stampa (a pagamento) https://www.lastampa.it/2018/12/18/tecnologia/il-giorno-in-cui-linternet-archive-smise-di-salvare-il-web-nmcaGEt2f8uT4Q0QcUb1TM/premium.html

Cos'è la globalizzazione? Un fatto reale e analogico che cerchiamo di definire in maniera digitale, on-off, bianco-nero. Però un segnale di discontinuità esiste: è la "nave cinese". L'infografica del South China Morning Post è quasi un romanzo interattivo. Bastava poco più e ci facevi un'app a pagamento... Money quote: "Globalisation is thought to have its beginnings in the 16th century when the Spanish silver dollar went transcontinental. Its acceptance as common currency arose when Spanish navigators in the Philippines established a circular shipping route, known as the tornaviaje, between Asia and the Americas. More than 250 years of uninterrupted trade ensued between Asia and the rest of the world. And the ships playing this route were known as China Ships" https://multimedia.scmp.com/culture/article/spanish-galleon/chapter_01.html Ps: per gli appassionati, c'è anche questo sul clima di Hong Kong che si sta devastando... https://multimedia.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/extreme-weather/index.html

 I benefici del roaming europeo: quintuplicato il traffico dati - Il mio articolo per Macity https://www.macitynet.it/i-benefici-del-roaming-europeo-quintuplicato-il-traffico-dati/

Inchiestona di Pro Publica su una delle aziende che svuotano i cassonetti di New York (il servizio è appaltato ad aziende private). Non soltanto perché è interessante leggerlo, ma perché vi dà anche la misura di come sia fatta un'inchiesta. Money quote: "An investigation by Voice of America and ProPublica, drawing on thousands of pages of public documents and interviews with more than a dozen current and former workers, depicts a workplace environment in which concerns about safety, as well as workers’ rights and compensation, are flouted despite years of complaints from workers to regulators. Records show that more than three-quarters of Sanitation Salvage trucks have been ordered off the road after federal safety checks. Yet the company has paid lobbyists to fight local legislation that backers say would compel haulers to improve on working conditions and safety. The Department of Labor several years ago found that Sanitation Salvage had cheated workers out of hundreds of thousands of dollars in wages. Today, the New York State Insurance Fund is suing the company for $780,000 in unpaid workers’ compensation insurance obligations for on-the-job injuries." https://features.propublica.org/sanitation-salvage/sanitation-salvage-accidents-new-york-city-commercial-carting-garbage/

Ci ha lasciato all’improvviso il curatore di Urania. Il mio ricordo su Fumettologica Addio Giuseppe Lippi, e grazie per tutto il pesce - Fumettologica http://www.fumettologica.it/2018/12/giuseppe-lippi-morto-urania/

Cydia è morto e il Jailbreak iPhone non sta troppo bene - Il mio articolo per Macity https://www.macitynet.it/cydia-morto-jailbreak-iphone/

È arrivato il momento di riscoprire la street photography, nell'accezione più ampia di fotografia che tratti "the interest and the investigation of people, architecture and forms that occur in public spaces and ran with it too". In questo caso, buona l'idea di arrivare lentamente al nocciolo della storia: la fotografia digitale declinata nei telefonini sta cambiando ancora il nostro sguardo. Ma alla fine, ammettiamolo, è un'arte. Money quote: "The thing to note about photography is that it doesn’t take hours, days, months to make a good photo (circumstantially, in some cases it does waiting for the right season/weather/moment etc) but specifically with street photography, you have to consider all rules, forms and techniques of composition in less than a split second to create these moments. This is what HCB was on about when he coined the words “decisive moment”. This is an important factor to consider when viewing and considering the artistic value of an image, especially a street photo." https://medium.com/photo-dojo/the-decisive-moment-street-photography-beyond-photojournalism-1a2dda1b23fd Come bonus, ecco alcuni buoni motivo per scattare (qualche volta) con la pellicola. Money quote 2: "Shooting film has slowed me down considerably but in a good way. The time between finishing a roll and seeing the results is roughly a week for me assuming I ship it to the lab as soon as I rewind. This separation time disconnects me emotionally from the work I did out on the street. When I see it again, it’s almost as with new eyes. Writers are encouraged to adopt a similar process of separation or disconnecting from their work then returning to it later. It improves objectivity and thus makes you a better critic of your own work." https://medium.com/photo-dojo/why-shoot-film-sometimes-113fee853fcf

Il calendario dell'avvento del codice: è per informatici o amanti dell'informatica, ma in generale è divertente e non richiede competenze tecniche Money quote: "Advent of Code is an Advent calendar of small programming puzzles for a variety of skill sets and skill levels that can be solved in any programming language you like. People use them as a speed contest, interview prep, company training, university coursework, practice problems, or to challenge each other. You don't need a computer science background to participate - just a little programming knowledge and some problem solving skills will get you pretty far. Nor do you need a fancy computer; every problem has a solution that completes in at most 15 seconds on ten-year-old hardware." https://adventofcode.com/2018

Alla fine, poi, per diventare elettrici cosa ci voleva? Guardate Shenzen: autobus elettrici, -48% dell'inquinamento. Seguono obbligatoriamente i taxi. Facile, no? Sono i costi e le stazioni di ricarica il problema? Se pensate al costo totale e non solo a quello dell'acquisto del bus o della costruzione della stazione elettrica, secondo me alla fine ci guadagnano piuttosto velocemente. Ma certamente noi abbiamo le nostre buone ragioni per non fare una cosa del genere... Money quote: "All 16,000 buses in Shenzhen are now electric. This will cut the city's CO2 emissions by 48% and help tackle their smog problem. Each bus costs 1.8 million yuan, so it's pretty expensive, but more than half the cost was paid for by government subsidies. Charging stations are a big bottleneck, so the city has built 40,000 charging stations. The buses can get 200 km per charge. By the end of the month, Shenzhen will require all 22,000 of the city's taxis to switch to electric as well. An interviewed passenger said "It's quieter, smoother and I only pay the same fare as before. I would say most people here are happy with the switch."" https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/dec/12/silence-shenzhen-world-first-electric-bus-fleet