cmcq

Accelerometers have come of age. Not so long ago, they cost the earth (or around $30) and output either a voltage or a duty cycle which tied up an ADC channel or a timer.

The LIS302, used in the Apple iPhone, is a much sweeter proposition. It has an SPI/I2C interface allowing you to read off the values directly. There are two configurable interrupt outputs which can be set to alert you when a certain threshold has been reached on the X,Y or Z axes, or when the device was tapped or double-tapped.

It's a Wii controller on a chip and only $10 in ones from Digikey.

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Some required reading that you're unlikely to come across in a bookshop.

The Self as a Center of Narrative Gravity, a compelling explanation of consciousness.

Vannevar Bush, As we May Think, astonishing prescience from 1945.

There's Plenty of Room at the Bottom, Richard Feynman ... which you've read already ... ?

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Serendipitously, passed Larry's house as he was having a garage sale. Not for sale were the contents of the actual garage: an immaculate E-type, an Austin Healey in the process of renovation, an early electric Volkswagen and a groovy dune buggy.

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I spotted this vanity tag on a pretty Lotus Elise shortly before I passed it.

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I was killing some time, walking between haircut and bookshop and BestBuy when I passed a car dealership. They had one I liked, so, after a suitable period of negotiation, I bought it.

Fortunately, I passed up they opportunity to drive the car first. The salesman took us for a drive instead. This was a clever move in retrospect. If I'd actually driven the car I wouldn't have bothered to haggle over the price.

After dinner, I went for a little rip down the 280 to Colma and bought a cheap laptop. Same color as the car.

Happy consumer, I.

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Called in at the Box Shop to meet some of the people building OrbSwarm. I found myself volunteering for this because they need help, I know some people involved and it was just too cool. They have an mechanical prototype constructed and running around in order to see where their plans conflict with reality.

They definitely know what they're doing, having made the "Serpent Mother" for BurningMan last year. Dozens of stainless-steel conjoined segments of the "Serpent Mother" were glinting in the sun outside.

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Andy premiered his new beer this afternoon, to great popular acclaim. It's a smooth ESB style with a subtle payload. I had the honor of naming the beer, Andy wrote the strapline and Darren designed and produced the labels. It should be noted that Andy and Darren put in some sterling work over the last few weeks, emptying the bottles that now contain 'Extra Sensory Beerception'.

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To Dorkbot-SF at Chicken John's place, just around the corner from my house.

Highlight of the evening was meeting one of my heroes, Rudy Rucker. (A colleague of mine later asked me, "What do you say in a situation like that?" "Something stupid, in my case", I replied.)

Rudy was talking about some of the ideas he has explored in previous books and some which will appear in 'Postsingular', the first novel of a new trilogy. Chief among these is the notion that computers as distinct entities will go away because everything will become a computer. Inspiration for this comes from Wolfram's observation that many natural processes are effectively performing class 4 computation and are therefore equivalent to Universal Turing Machines. A branch of a tree waving in the wind is doing a bunch of hard sums just to work out what it's going to do next. Rudy envisages a world where all this computation is put to better use - computing minds.

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On the freeway exit ramp nearest my house, there is often a rotating roster of homeless, panhandling at the stoplight. I used to carry a couple of small bills in the car to give to them.

In order to make a donation, I had to be fairly lucky. First, there would have to be a tramp on duty. Next, I would have to be in one of the first few cars caught at the stoplight. Stopping solely to make a donation would be asking to be rear-ended.

After a few weeks of unsuccessful donation, I hit upon a new strategy of disposing of my cash, while at the same time practicing my in-car origami skills.

To play along at home, you will need at least one banknote and one quarter. Two of each works better. Newer banknotes help.

Place the coin(s) on the reverse of the note behind the president's face. Fold the shorter side of the note over and around the coins. Fold in the sides with a slight taper. Fold the free end around the coin and tuck into the flap.

The first time I tried this, I tossed it out the window as I passed and hit the unfortunate hobo in the vicinity of his nuts.

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