Archive for November, 2009

Random things I learned this weekend

- 1. the word ‘disavail’ does not exist; apparently I have made it up, and the word I was prolly after was ‘disabuse’, but I kind of like the possible meaning of my own version of things…
- 2. it is possible to enjoy a mysterious surge of traffic  in spite of not having blogged a [...]

Failure nets : the ‘dark matter’ of complex systems

A thought:
Complex systems are prone to fail and, knowing that, we build into them every manner of defense against such outcomes. If we consider complex systems as networks, with the number and variety of nodes of any type being some sort of measure of overall complexity, the nodes, edges and paths all hold a binary [...]

Scribblenauts, and the law of requisite variety

When I came across the game scribblenauts – or more specifically, when enraptured, evangelising s’nauting colleagues at work jumped me and made me partake –  I wasn’t as impressed with the idea behind the game as I was with the fact that it had actually been pulled off.
Someone had posited the idea of modelling “everything”, had [...]

My caramel escape plan

Sugar at high temperatures, and actionscript 3.
This might prove to be a very dangerous case of multitasking, but I’m sat by the window trying to bootstrap the bootstrapper of my brand new application, to be written in AS3. And at the same time I’m trying to learn how to make candy.

utility socialising : the future of social media?

Technology extends the reach of the average human being. Sometimes almost literally (eg the way a car kinda ‘makes your legs longer’  since it allows you to cover more ground).
In the same way, social media extends our reach in terms of our ability to connect with more people. What I hadn’t banked on, or expected, [...]