T-shirt is FAIL (nerd alert)

I’m sorry, but the statement on this shirt is misleading and totally incorrect. I wish it were cooler, because it has so much potential, but whoever made it doesn’t know the first thing about how a base-2 numbering system works. They obviously just asked a CS major in their dorm what “2” is in binary. What they fail to grasp is that 2 to people is actually three to computers.

The shirt says, “There are only 10 types of people in the world: those who understand binary and those who don’t.” The statement implies that everyone falls into one of two categories. What’s misleading is that if you wanted to write an Arabic two in binary it is in fact 10.

I know it’s confusing. Let’s consider an example where you have a computer over for dinner. You and the computer enjoy a wonderful meal and for dessert you plan to have ice cream. If you tell the computer that the number of ice cream flavors in the freezer is “2” it’s going to think there are actually three different kinds.

Now, the computer’s not trying to be difficult. There’s actually a good reason for this. When a computer needs to count a series of something it starts at zero, not at one like all of us sensible human beings do. If you wanted to tell the computer in binary that there are three flavors of ice cream you would need to tell it there are 1 (sic) flavors.

That being said, if you starting counting at one, as all sensible people would, decimal 2 would be 1 in binary. It really doesn’t work as a joke, even when you consider that “computer” number series start at zero, unless you state otherwise. Zero is always zero whether it’s in binary, decimal, octal, hexadecimal, or some other really weird numbering system. And one is one. But what value you have assigned to those symbols is what really matters. I won’t even tell you what sixteen is in hexadecimal.

The moral of this is don’t buy this shirt if you want intelligent people to think you are a computer nerd. Should you encounter anyone with half a brain while wearing this shirt you will only wind up looking like a fool for being unable to explain why 10 is actually two in binary and why that two doesn’t mean three.

Oh, and sixteen in hexadecimal is F. Just the letter F. F is for Fail.

New iTunes DJ enables playlists of the people

Apple has released version 8.1 of its iTunes software with some patches, some upgrades and a couple new features.

My favorite of these is the iTunes DJ. The iTunes DJ resembles what was previously called called “Party Shuffle.” Maybe Apple’s iTunes team was worried no one was using this feature, maybe they felt threatened by the rising phenomenons of DJs using iPods to play music for crowds. Whatever the reason, what they seem to have done is used Bonjour-based technology to enable new functionality in iPhones and iPod Touch devices with the iTunes Remote apps installed.

This technology allows remote interaction with the iTunes DJ, allowing users to request, vote for and add songs to the playlist, depending on the amount of access granted by the iTunes “Administrator.”

Reporter runs a spam campaign on air via botnet

This is amazing.

I always knew that running a spam campaign would be easy – once you got in touch with the “rancher” but I’ve never actually seen an operator run one.

The BBC television program Click has done an episode where a reporter shows – once you have everything in place – just how easy it is to do.

It’s a renter’s market

I love this image. LOL

In addition to the general dearth of housing properties that has been created in the So Cal real estate market over the last five years, there is also the specter of decreasing demand. As the unemployment/underemployment rate in Los Angeles hovers near 20% people are leaving California faster than they are arriving and we may start to see a stabilization in the population for the first time since Europeans started arriving here four-hundred fifty years ago (I looked it up).

LAist is reporting that this phenomenon has resulted in something many of us have been able to see first hand: in LA renters have gained the upper hand.

Since 2003 I’ve had to relocate twice due to “Demolition Eviction” notices (first in December of 2004 and again in March 2006). You get a Demolition Eviction” notice when your landlord decides to cash in on the boom in the real-estate market and turn your building into a condo complex. I’d been so traumatized by it I sought refuge in Santa Monica where the process almost never takes place.

These relocations gave me an opportunity to get a great feel for the West L.A. housing rental market. When I looked at it again in January I got to see how depressed the market had become in the last two years. Most monthly rental rates had decreased 10% in that period.

So, it’s nice to see some relief in this area. I’ve always been astounded at what we pay to rent property in this area. New York is really the only other major metropolitan area I can think of that outprices us.

Makes me weep with pride.