Instrument Odyssey

Sitting with a friend the other day, discussing music, a question arose: what does the future hold for musical instruments?

Naturally, we started with an aside, trying to nail down the major categories of sound making – woodwind, percussion, brass, and vibration. But doesn’t vibration encompass all of those? Surely, since it is the basis of sound itself. Unable to derive an instrumental taxonomy, we moved on.

Well, recent advances? In our lifetimes (admittedly short thus far), what have we seen? For one, the dominant rise of the computer as a musical tool. Instruments began playing with electric fire long ago, but the recent digitization of music has brought on the city-engulfing blaze. Witness electronica.

Let us not forget, however, that there have been some mistakes down this road.

I would also purport to say that the turntable rightly deserves to be mentioned as another recent inductee, having ushered in hip-hop, rap, electronica, and the glory of glitch. Interestingly, it also serves to contrast computer-induced digitization by being overtly analog. To the point, I’ve also heard that CD and/or iPod based turntables have not been welcomed by the DJ community, and although this is most likely due to the importance of the uniqueness of one’s stack of vinyl, I imagine that love for the analog hiss may have a small part to play as well.

And the future? The prospect of beautiful, interactive electronic instruments seems just on the horizon, as evidenced by this demonstration. Check out the additional videos on the sidebar and take note of the line-in widget. In addition to pure electronica, I can imagine live bands being remixed and conducted by a director of sorts, who joins them on stage, driving far more interaction than today’s engineer at the soundboard. And digital luthier has a great ring to it.

Who really knows what else. I wait to be pleasantly surprised by the mad audio scientist craftsmen the world over.

Neat Music Guide

A cool Flash electronic music guide.

Of Readers and Feeds

In the beginning… I wasn’t a fan of feed readers at all. I enjoyed visiting each site, taking in the uniqueness, the design, the atmosphere that made each one familiar.

Alas, the reading list grew, convenience crept in, and so began the Journey of Aggregation. These days, I hardly visit sites from which I feed, and pangs of annoyance arise when the full post isn’t syndicated.

I think My First Reader™ was RSSOwl, Java-based and pretty, but ultimately doomed by browser-related bugs in Linux (admittedly, a problem with SWT at the time, and I’m sure quite squashed by now). Next was Liferea, a GTK reader which I used for a long stretch. I eventually ditched it in favor of web-based readers when I got tired of the lack of synchronization between work and home.

Actually, to backtrack a little and provide a bit of foreshadowing as well (oooh!), I did try Google Reader in between the two desktop apps. At the time, however, it sucked – slow, terrible interface, and a misguided attempt to create a melting pot of posts. I moved on.

Post-Liferea, I migrated to Bloglines, and was quite happy with it. I didn’t need to worry about re-marking read posts anymore, and the site was pretty snappy. I was sold on web-based readers.

As it has a tendency to do, however, Google recently played a trump – an updated Reader without equal. Kudos for seeing the flaws in the original application and completely overhauling the whole damn thing. Its similarity to Gmail has made it effortless to use and I’m hooked to the trends page, which I hope they expand (I’m a sucker for metrics). Altogether, simply the best tool yet for feeds.

Reading List

Here’s what I’m currently imbibing. Or, the OPML version, if you prefer.

Dev:

• A List Apart
• Coding Horror
• Err the Blog
• Joel on Software
• Musings
• Signal vs. Noise
• Stevey’s Blog Rants
• Vitamin

Tech:

• Ars Technica
• Daring Fireball
• Journals.ars
• Official Google Blog
• Slashdot
• TechCrunch

Zeit:

• blogforsamurai.com
• FREEwilliamsburg
• Gawker
• Penny-Arcade
• reddit.com
• Subtraction
• the show with zefrank
• WFMU’s Beware of the Blog
• xkcd.com
• ze’s page :: zefrank.com

Bit of a Redesign

Just a few changes…

• I liked the larger font size, such a two-point-oh hallmark, but it was rendering worse than the current, smaller size. At least, for me.
• After switching back and forth between Georgia and Arial, I decided to stick with Georgia. I like its print feel, even if sans-serif fonts dominate rightfully because of their readability.
• The icons are gone. First, they used PNG transparency, and were useless for IE 6. And second, making them was slowing me down – slinging GIMP and Inkscape using a touchpad may actually be the definition of impede.
• Rounded corners no more.

The Hours

I am susceptible to the coding threat known as the deep hesitation. Every once in a while, I find myself staring at the editor, hypnotized by a design problem or possible refactor. It’s a paralyzing belief that a higher, better way exists, elusive and beyond reach.

Oftentimes, these code dreams begin to multiply, and the One becomes Many. Each of these hellspawn reveals itself coyly as glimpses before the next one comes swooping in for attention. And the swap goes on…

Needless to say, wasting time in this manner is frustrating.

Try not. Do.

The best answer I have to this problem comes from the Church of Test-Driven Development; namely, “Do the simplest thing that works”. Forget about optimization or elegance and simply solve the problem. I find that if I just start writing, perhaps a hare-brained idea or an ugly hack, the juices that start flowing as a result often spur me towards a better solution.

Besides, coding as an iterative solution makes sense. Writing and refactoring are universal traits of nearly all creative activities. Sure, every once in a while a ray of light may illuminate your way. But on the rainy days, just do the hard work.

Sink or Swim

A good friend recently decided on a sea change – he’s taken an unpaid internship. For an indeterminate amount of future, he will be slaving for free. In New York City.

He has a job, but it’s not a career. Like most twenty-six year old college graduates, he’s become a capable employee. I’d go so far as to say valuable in this case. But that surely isn’t enough. What pride wells up from a lukewarm profession is swiftly melted when confronted by real passion. He walks through spreadsheets, spins useless cycles on government drudgery, and then comes home to real work.

And so he’s found an exit out and an entrance in, and the fee, unfortunately, is steep. Sure, the prospect of Ramen-all-the-time is grim. So is the likely cutback on the city’s recreational offerings. Legitimate concerns.

We should all be so brave.

The End of "the show"

the show with ze frank, comes to a close this month. For the uninitiated, get thither, and bask under the weight of a year’s worth. Start with your birthday. Maybe pick a few holidays.

And of course, thanks Ze.

Revived

After quite the hiatus, the foodforsamurai.com blog is back, redubbed blogforsamurai.com. Hooray.

Stark and sleek, retaining the laid-back posting environment of the original. As well, there is no predetermined theme here, just stuff as I see fit.

The site also rebounds with a new engine, custom-developed with an amazing lack of features. Comments? Sorry, no. IE6 on Windows? Ugly. But expect changes over time.

Feels good to be back.