Month: March 2016

We have a concert here now!)

Amazon Dash. Somehow it passed me by. The idea is simply superb.

Dash Button – a small device with the logo of the product that can be ordered by pressing the only button present on the case. The Dash Button attaches to any surface using either double-sided tape or a hook (both are included in the package). With the Dash Button, you can now order “consumables”: personal hygiene items, food (including pet food), cleaning supplies, and such.

The button costs 5 bucks.

Interesting hack: it can be repurposed for unofficial personal use. https://geektimes.ru/post/269008/ The principle is as follows: pressing the button activates a Wi-Fi client, which sends a push request with the button’s ID to Amazon. Amazon knows who it came from and immediately dispatches laundry detergent.

So, the hack involves the button connecting not to a WiFi point but to a server running Ubuntu, which, instead of letting it access the internet, makes it do something else useful (like ordering cookies to your office). This requires a bit of knowledge in administration and programming.

http://www.amazon.com/dash-button

Hm, the Washington Balalaika Orchestra concert. You really can find anything here.

http://www.forumdaily.com/event/110589/

This is how a music lesson goes in the car school (see pictures on the blog)

There is also a separate class where they play violins and similar string instruments.

Since Masha didn’t play either a wind instrument or the violin, she will have to learn how to use this Percussion Kit (see pictures on the blog)

It will have to be rented for home practice. So soon my piano will have some “friends”.

Quotes from Steve Jobs from The Lost Interview

“…I sold my Volkswagen bus and Steve Wozniak sold his calculator and we got enough money to pay friends of ours to make the artwork to make a printed circuit board.”

Here’s another interesting story:

I read an article when I was very young in Scientific American and it measured the efficiency of locomotion for various species on the planet.

So for bears and chimps and raccoons and birds and fish—how many kilocalories per kilometer did they spend to move—and humans were measured too, and the condor won.

It was the most efficient, and mankind, the crown of creation, came in with a rather unimpressive showing about a third of the way down the list.

But somebody there had the brilliance to test a human riding a bicycle. Blew away the condor. All the way off the charts. I remember that this really had an impact on me.

I really remember this, that humans are tool builders and we build tools that can dramatically amplify our innate human abilities. And to me, we actually ran an ad like this very early on at Apple that the personal computer was the bicycle of the mind.

Ha-ha) this is the official Instagram of Russia’s Ministry of Culture:)

https://www.instagram.com/p/BCaKeO6SXM6/