Mitch Wagner's Blog

Every Doctor Who theme (video)

The Doctor seems to have gotten younger over the past 47 years of regenerations. Not uniformly, but most of the less-recent Doctors are older than the 21st Century ones.

Is the Christopher Eccleston Doctor the only one who doesn’t dress funny?

Via Boing Boing

How many meals should you eat in a day?

You’ll see lots of articles on the Web saying you should eat five or six meals a day. As is often the case with health advice, these articles are pretty authoritative-sounding, but don’t actually cite any evidence to support the claim:

Here’s an example:

People should have five to six small meals per day. According to studies, people should eat every three to four hours because the food digests completely after four hours. So it is important for people to eat frequently because the body needs new food to have energy in order to stay healthy.

Oh, yeah? Says who? Which studies?

I’ve lost 69 pounds since March 2009. I’ve done it through a combination of exercise and counting calories — eat less, move around more. But according to common wisdom, I’d be better of changing my eating pattern. In addition to recommending five or six meals a day, common wisdom says you should have a big breakfast, and the rest of your meals should be smaller. But my pattern goes like this:

• Walk for an hour immediately after rising.
• Eat a medium-sized breakfast.
• Sometimes have a snack in the late morning.
• Have a medium-sized lunch.
• Usually have a small snack in the late afternoon.
• Eat a big dinner.
• Have a big snack before bedtime. Sometimes my bedtime snack has more calories than my dinner.

I’ve been concerned that I’m doing it wrong, but I’ve talked to my doctor and done some Google research, and I think I’m fine. In particular, I find this article trustworthy: 3-Hour Diet or 3 Meals a Day?. The author is a registered and licensed dietician with a masters in public health, and she quotes actual MDs and actual studies by name. The article boils down to: Whatever works for you. My eating habits, bizarre though they may seem to some people, are certainly working for me.

Earlier, I researched another piece of common wisdom: Don’t eat before bedtime. I don’t have the links, but really it’s OK for many people to eat before bedtime. I eat a big snack before bedtime and seldom have trouble sleeping, so I’m fine.. If you eat before bedtime, and often have trouble sleeping, then you might want to lay off the bedtime snack, especially if your trouble sleeping is caused by indigestion.

Jane Austen's Fight Club (video)

“The first rule of fight club is one never mentions fight club.”

Via Boing Boing

Remix of scenes in Mad Men of people smoking cigarettes (video)

I smoked occasionally as a teen, heavily from when I was 19 until I was about 30, then quit, after about a million failed attempts.

I loved smoking. I lit up a cigarette before my feet hit the floor in the morning at the beginning of the day, and after I got into bed and turned out the light at the end of the day, and about 50 times in between. I was up to 2-½ packs a day. Quitting was extremely difficult.

Now the whole thing, both smoking and quitting, seems like something that happened to someone else.

via Boing Boing

E-books on the iPad

When I first got the iPad, I started reading e-books on it exclusively, eschewing paper books. I thought that maybe I’d gravitate back to paper books when the novelty of the iPad wears off.

Nearly four months later, and there’s no sign of that happening. I just like reading books on the iPad. It’s the free sample chapters that get me, and their opportunity for instant gratification. Read the first chapter of a book, if you like it, buy it on the spot, if you don’t like it, you’re not out any money.

I prefer the Amazon Kindle app to the iBooks app, because the Kindle app is available on multiple platforms, but the iBooks app is only available on iOS. I might switch to another tablet platform in a few years — I want to be able to take my digital library with me.

I wrote these articles about reading and writing on the iPad:

8 highly useful apps for reading and writing on the iPad

Also:

4 iPad apps for hand-writing and idea-sketching

Apple investigating iPhone 3G software complaints

Users of old iPhone 3Gs are complaining about slowness and bugginess on their phones after upgrading to the latest operating system version. Now, Apple is looking into the problem.

I wrote about my experiences upgrading my iPhone 3G to iOS 4 in late June, when the new operating system version came out. I wrote, "As for performance: There doesn't seem to be any net change over iOS 3.x. My faithful iPhone 3G doesn't seem to run any faster under iOS 4, but it doesn't seem to run any slower either."

But readers told a different story. They expressed their frustration in comments on that blog. Reader Kevin Lynch complained of "slow response, applications crashing repeatedly, typing in apps like iFitness taking forever, text message response unbearably slow etc. etc."

Read the rest of my post at the Computerworld Tool Talk Blog: Apple investigating iPhone 3G software complaints

Tips for posting iPhone 4 videos to YouTube

The iPhone 4 lets you easily share great, high-definition videos to YouTube. But there are a couple of gotchas to watch out for. After banging my head against the keyboard for a day trying to figure out why I couldn't get high-definition videos to post, I'll pass along what I learned, so you can save wear and tear on your forehead.

I started my learning experience Sunday evening, as I was wrapping up my post on iPhone 4 photography at Comic-Con. I'd done everything except upload my video to YouTube. I was in a rush to get done and watch the season premiere of Mad Men.

I'd already sidestepped the first iPhone-YouTube gotcha. The iPhone takes nice high-definition 720p video, and you can share that video through e-mail, or through the iPhone's built-in YouTube uploader. However, the problem with sharing video directly from the iPhone is that the iPhone steps on the video quality, compressing it before sending it, making your nice, high-definition video not-so-nice and decidedly low-definition

You can use the free PixelPipe or PicPosterous iPhone apps to share your videos in their full high-definition glory. But I didn't want to mess with that over the weekend. I exported the videos from my iPhone to my desktop using iPhoto on the Mac, and watched the video there. The video looked great, nice and sharp and clear.

I uploaded the video file straight from my desktop to YouTube using the Web uploader. And when I looked at the video on YouTube, it looked pixellated and jaggy and terrible.

Read the rest of my post at the Computerworld Tool Talk Blog: Tips for posting iPhone 4 videos to YouTube

Trying to decide if I want Apple's new Magic Trackpad

On the one hand, it’s the N!E!W S!H!IN!Y from Apple, so of course I want it.

On the other hand, it’s a trackpad. I’ve never really liked trackpads. I like a trackball. I really like my Logitech Trackball Wheel.

Also,“Magic Trackpad” sounds gross. It sounds like a phrase uttered by a child-molesting department-store Santa. “Come and sit on my Magic Trackpad, little girl.” Ick.

Is jailbreaking iPhones a business opportunity?

The U.S. government this week decided that jailbreaking iPhones doesn't violate copyright law. Does that mean we'll start to see businesses cropping up selling legally hacked, customized iPhones?

The U.S. Copyright Office and Library of Congress announced Monday that jailbreaking is one of several practices that don't violate the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA).

Modifications purely for the purpose of making an iPhone, or other, similarly protected device, compatible with third-party software are fair use, Marybeth Peters, register of Copyrights, wrote in a ruling. She described jailbreaking as "innocuous at worst, and beneficial at best."

Read the rest of my post at the Computerworld Tool Talk Blog: Is jailbreaking iPhones a business opportunity?

The iPhone 4 goes to San Diego Comic-Con

With a convention center full of costume-clad fans, San Diego's annual Comic-Con is always a great opportunity to people-watch and take pictures. I dropped by Saturday to give the camera on my new iPhone 4 a good workout.

The camera is one of my favorite things about the iPhone 4. I've always liked photography. I don't like fooling around with settings, I just want to point my camera at something, take a picture, and share it with other people.

I was really looking forward to getting the iPhone 4, with its advanced new still and video camera capabilities. The timing, for me, was perfect; I got the phone a couple of weeks before Comic-Con, time to get comfortable with it before taking it to the show.

I'd already reviewed the iPhone 4 camera compared with the camera on the HTC EVO 4G, and made a complete comparison of both phones. But Comic-Con is a whole new level of testing for a camera, there's lots of stuff going on around you at all times. How well would the iPhone 4 fare?

Very well, it turns out. I was already very happy with the iPhone 4, and the Comic-Con workout makes me even happier.

Previous generations of iPhones had weak cameras, even by cameraphone standards. But the camera on the iPhone 4 is one of its great strengths. It's a respectable point-and-shoot camera.

Read the rest of my post at the Computerworld Tool Talk Blog: The iPhone 4 goes to San Diego Comic-Con

In honor of Mad Men's return, two old ads that don't look so good today

What single feature of today's cars assures maximum safety? I'll name three -- baby sits facing front, wears a seat-belt, and Mom keeps her freakin eyes on the road.

Also, this isn't going to get you a visit from the Division of Youth and Family Services, nossir.

Jameson's on the rocks

Jameson's on the rocks

Birthday presents from Julie

iPhone accessories. I've been thinking I need something like these.

See and download the full gallery on posterous

Blogging gets new life

Social media like Twitter and Facebook aren't killing blogging. Social media make blogging stronger.

Cory Doctorow writes that blogging isn't dying, "it's just that other social media have taken over many of its functions."

When blogging was the easiest, most prominent way to produce short, informal, thinking-aloud pieces for the net, we all blogged. Now that we have Twitter, social media platforms and all the other tools that continue to emerge, many of us are finding that the material we used to save for our blogs has a better home somewhere else. And some of us are discovering that we weren't bloggers after all – but blogging was good enough until something more suited to us came along.

Read the rest of my post at the Computerworld Tool Talk Blog: Blogging gets new life

Review of "That Old Cape Magic," by Richard Russo

I somehow missed this one when it came out last year, although I’m something of a Richard Russo fanatic. Russo is the author of Nobody’s Fool, which was made into a movie starring Paul Newman, about a 60-year-old handyman who is just growing up. He also wrote the Pulitzer Prize-winning Empire Falls.

Russo seems to write two kinds of books: One type is books about people living in decaying small towns in upstate New York and Maine. The other type is comprised of and Straight Man (1997) and last year’s That Old Cape Magic, which are about middle-aged academics going through midlife crises.

Science fiction fans like to denigrate literary fiction by saying it’s both by and about middle-aged academics going through midlife crises. So it’s nice to actually find an example of the cliche in the real world. When science fiction fans denigrate literary fiction, they make it sound all dreary, depressing and boring. Russo’s academics are frequently depressed, but they’re never bored, and they screw up their lives with great zeal and elan.

The main character of That Old Cape Magic is Griffin, a man in his late 50s who’s been driving around for a year with his father’s ashes in the trunk of his car. His mother is alive, and nags him incessantly on his cell phone. Griffin’s father and mother were academics, English professors bitter about failing to make it to the Ivy League and instead teaching at small colleges in the Midwest — or the Mid-fucking-West, as they like to say. Griffin is a college professor too, and a former Hollywood screenwriter (as is Russo himself). When the novel opens, Griffin is on his way to Cape Cod for the wedding of his daughter’s best friend. It’s like driving into the past for Griffin; summers on the Cape Cod are the only time he can remember his parents being happy. Or, as close to being happy as they ever got.

At the opening of the novel, Griffin is as close to being happy as he’s ever going to get. He has a wife who he loves and who loves him back, he has a great job, and a great family and friends. The novel goes on to describe how he nearly destroys it all.

Which, like I said, sounds pretty depressing, but which Russo actually handles with great humor and joy.

The novel jumps backward and forward in time much in the way life does, something happens in the present day and it reminds Griffin of something that happened long ago.

The novel has as many twists and turns as any science fiction or mystery story. I found myself staying up hours past my bedtime to read on and find out what happens next. Russo has delightful little bits of humorous observation and jokes.

One note that I find interesting as a technology nerd and Russo fan: Contemporary technology is mostly missing from Russo’s previous books, but the characters of That Old Cape Magic live in the 21st Century. They use the Internet, they Google, and conversations on cell phones and via instant messaging are central to the plot.

iPhone 4 vs. HTC EVO 4G real-world camera test

I tested video and still photo quality for the Apple iPhone 4 and the
HTC EVO 4G running Android. Take a look and judge for yourself which
is the best.

I take a lot of pictures. I like to have a little point-and-shoot that
I can aim and click whenever I see something interesting, and share
those photos on the Internet. Serious photographers approve of my
philosophy. "The best camera," they say, "is the one you always have
with you."

And I always have my smartphone with me. This year, cameraphones are
competitive with good point-and-shoot cameras for image quality. When
I started to plan to upgrade my aging iPhone 3G in the spring, one of
my top criteria for a replacement was that the new smartphone had to
have a great camera.

I compared two of the top-of-the-line smartphones, the HTC EVO 4G,
available from Sprint, and the Apple iPhone 4. For a complete comparison of both phones, check out my feature article on
Computerworld today. For now, let's talk a bit about the cameras.

Both phones have great cameras. Each phone has two cameras: A
rear-facing, high-quality camera, and a front-facing, lower quality
camera, for videoconferencing and self-portraits (which the Young
People Nowadays call "selfies"). Both cameras also have LED flashes.

Read the rest of my post at the Computerworld Tool Talk Blog: iPhone 4 vs. HTC EVO 4G real-world camera test

Real-world testing: iPhone 4 vs. HTC EVO 4G

Our writer spent a few weeks with the Apple iPhone 4 and the HTC
EVO 4G. Which came out ahead?

I've been using an iPhone
for three years now, first the original iPhone then the 3G. I like the
iPhone a lot -- but I'm not married to it. When I began hearing great
things about the Sprint's Android
phone, the HTC EVO 4G, I thought hard about switching. And although I eventually decided to upgrade to the iPhone 4, I was curious what I was missing.

The good people at Sprint let me borrow an EVO for a few weeks, and I
compared it to my personal iPhone 4. I found that there were a lot of
factors where one phone excelled over the other -- but that, in the
end, it was hard to choose between them.

What follows are my observations about how the two phones compared in
a variety of aspects. In each case, I've chosen the phone I think is
the winner in each category -- when there was a winner.

Read the rest of my Computerworld feature article: Real-world testing: iPhone 4 vs. HTC EVO 4G

7 greatest hits from Apple's quarterly earnings call

Apple continues to party like it's 1999, the height of the dotcom
boom. While other companies struggle with the recession, Apple turned
in another banner quarter, breaking revenue records and enjoying
voracious demand for the iPad, the iPhone and Mac. Here are seven
highlights from Tuesday's earnings call.

Recession? Apple hasn't heard about it.

Mac and iPad sales pushed Apple to record revenue in the third quarter, with
sales of $15.7 billion, up 61% year-over-year, and net profit of $3.25
billion.

The iPhone bug doesn't seem to have hurt sale

Consumer enthusiasm for the iPhone 4 doesn't seem to have been
diminished by reports of problems with the device's antenna. We can't know for sure, the quarter
closed June 26, before reports of the problem became widespread, and
just two days after the phone went on sale. We won't really know how
much the iPhone 4 problem hurt sales until the next quarterly
conference call.

Read the rest of my post at the Computerworld Tool Talk Blog: 7 greatest hits from Apple's quarterly earnings call

Highway overpass (photo)

Duke's Liquor (photo)

Regulate Google? Why not? It worked great for BP

A recent editorial in the New York Times argues that Google has become
so important that it requires oversight to be sure its search engine
algorithm is fair. But the Times fails to show that there are any
problems at Google, or that government regulation would help.

In an editorial entitled "The Google Algorithm," the Times writes, "a case is building
for some sort of oversight of the gatekeeper of the Internet."

Read the rest of my post at the Computerworld Tool Talk Blog: Regulate Google? Why not? It worked great for BP

Canna lily flower (photo)

It's growing in our backyard artificial bog.

What Steve Jobs should have said about the iPhone 4 antenna

The iPhone's antenna design was a trade-off: You get better reception
under most conditions, and a smaller phone with better battery life.
Unfortunately, under some conditions, you'll get worse reception.

That's what Steve Jobs should have said on Friday. Daring Fireball's
John Gruber makes that point in his analysis following Apple's
unusual press conference, where CEO Steve Jobs and top executives
defended the iPhone 4 against criticism that poor antenna design leads
to dropped calls when users touch the bottom-left edge of the device.
Gruber writes:

What I took away from the press conference is that Apple
believes the iPhone 4 antenna is better than the previous iPhone
antennas, but it has a more sensitive “weak spot”. And, that more
sensitive weak spot is inherent to the external antenna design. In
short, that it’s a trade-off — better signal quality overall, better
aesthetics, more structural rigidity, even better battery life because
there’s room for a bigger battery without an internal antenna. The
trade-off is that all of those benefits come at the expense of a more
sensitive “weak spot”. (I put that in quotes because it’s Jobs’s term
for the infamous lower-left gap in the antenna frame.)

Read the rest of my post at the Computerworld Tool Talk Blog: What Steve Jobs should have said about the iPhone 4 antenna

Colorado Avenue, a block from our house (pic)