Steve Fischer's Random Blog

Author: fish1964

  • Jackasses of the Week

    I first heard this via a political writer on Twitter:

    https://twitter.com/joshtpm/status/907967027448598529

    In response to:

    https://twitter.com/FastCompany/status/907952827858911232

    He followed the first tweet with more amusing snark, but then I read John Gruber’s post, Jackasses of the Week, on Daring Fireball:

    I don’t write much about “Silicon Valley” as a culture, because I don’t live there and, frankly, I don’t care. But the fact that this startup is being taken seriously is absurd. It’s a company named Bodega, and Fast Company’s headline says it all: “Two Ex-Googlers Want To Make Bodegas And Mom-And-Pop Corner Stores Obsolete”.

    First, all they’ve done is make a fancy vending machine. That’s great. Vending machines are a real thing, and maybe there’s a market for better ones. But better vending machines are still just vending machines.

    Second, what kind of sociopaths are these people that they want to put mom-and-pop corner stores and bodegas out of business? Local family-owned stores are what make for great neighborhoods. They’re good people running good businesses that people love. Good startup ideas are things that replace products or services that people hate. Taxis suck, for example. That’s why ride sharing services are so popular and successful. Bodegas and corner stores are great.

    Third, as Helen Rosner argues in this thread, they’ve got a crummy business model.

    Fuck these guys.

    Can’t top that.

     

  • One Born Every Minute

    I’m sure I never would have heard of this, except a science writer posted something mocking this product for claiming to use the same material used in NASA space suits (claim since retracted). There is a product called Body Vibes. They are wearable stickers. It is believed by some they might do something.

    body-vibes-how-to-vibe-placements1

    According to their site:

    Body Vibes contain frequencies believed to have various harmonizing effects on the human body. Of course, not all human bodies are the same, so the effects may be different. Through a proprietary technology, these frequencies are recorded, condensed, and stored within the Body Vibes sticker, in much the same way that you would save a file to your computer’s hard drive. When the Body Vibes sticker is properly applied to your skin, it begins broadcasting the stored frequency, which may influence the mind/body bio-field with signals transferred through sympathetic resonance. This interchange of frequencies is believed to have balancing effects on particular systems within the body.

    That’s the most spectacular gibberish I’ve read in a while. It manages to be meaningless while still hedging the benefits with “may” and  “believed to”.

    The Anti-Anxiety 10 pack is only $60, so get them while you can…

  • Remembering

    Hard to believe it’s been 16 years…

    11usbriefing-911-master768

  • I Love Art Because…

    Via SMBC, as usual…

    It's a shame there wasn't ever a snake-biting-someone's-dick movement in art.

  • Google Photos Assistant

    We just got back from vacation at our usual place in Cape Cod. You can take the pictures from the posts from any previous years, imagine my daughters slightly older, and that’s how it was. We just love the spot (Skaket Beach, Orleans MA).

    Our beach is a great sunset beach. People arrive at the beach at 7 PM just for the sunset. When the sun sets, they applaud. So at the end of every vacation I have a plethora of sunset pictures. And with all of them, my reaction is “yeah, but it was even better”.

    As a long time Google Photos user, I love how they will pick pictures and try to enhance them. They almost always pick some sunset pictures. Here are the nine pictures that Google decided to enhance from this vacation. One is really two pictures stitched together as a panorama. Every picture here was taken from our deck (with my phone).

    20170827_090724-EFFECTS20170824_191842-EFFECTS20170820_191138-EFFECTS20170819_192926-PANO20170819_191404-EFFECTS20170818_191519-EFFECTS20170816_123257-EFFECTS20170814_192347-EFFECTS20170813_194240-EFFECTS

    Thanks Google.

  • Murderer

    Via, Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal, which thankfully my wife does not read…

    BUT WHERE ELSE AM I SUPPOSED TO PUT MY TI-83?!

  • Holy Shit, Look at the Sky

    Via xkcd…

    eclipse_science_2x

  • Guam

    When I was in college I recall telling my roommate that Guam was just an inherently funny word. I felt all jokes were funnier if they had the word Guam in them.

    I’m obviously reminded of this today since current Guam references are very much not funny.

    And I’m also amused by all the “where is Guam?” articles in the news. Some folks that know me well, know that I worked for Ringling Brothers on a Japan tour. We had about three weeks off while everything moved from Osaka to Tokyo, so the trumpet section (of which I was a part) took a vacation to Saipan.

    No one in the U.S. has heard of Saipan, but it’s a popular Japanese tourist destination and it’s right by Guam. Being Americans we were a novelty and made friends with all the folks who worked there. And we literally had a pizza delivered from the Domino’s in Guam. It took more than 30 minutes (not official delivery, a guy had a boat and got it). I’m not a big Domino’s fan, but after months of no true American pizza, it was awesome.

    Saipan was awesome too. Crazy gorgeous.

    Hopefully the Guam Domino’s will be OK…

  • Vacation

    I didn’t realize how long it had been since my last blog post. I don’t want to post about politics and these days it seems hard to avoid, hence my absence.

    And I’m about to go on our regular Cape Cod vacation. It will look a lot like any one of these posts:

    https://fish1964.wordpress.com/2016/08/29/cape-cod-vacation-7/

    https://fish1964.wordpress.com/2015/08/24/google-and-cape-cod/

    https://fish1964.wordpress.com/2012/08/26/cape-cod-2012/

    https://fish1964.wordpress.com/2011/08/28/cape-cod-2011/

    https://fish1964.wordpress.com/2010/08/31/cape-cod/

    Or you can just do a Google image search on “skaket beach“

  • Participation is its own Trophy

    This post is only funny in context. Not true actually, it’s funny to me all the time. But for context, here’s 70 things Millennials have killed. I like the picture at the top and the caption (A millennial plotting to destroy the auto industry) because that is obviously Brooklyn.

    I actually found those two links by reading I am sorry for killing everything: A millennial’s confession.